On Sept. 15, the first “30 People Forum of the Yangtze River Economic Belt” was held at Yangtze University, Hubei Province. The participating scholars discussed how to achieve high-quality growth of the Yangtze River Economic Belt (“the Belt”) in the new era.

For high-quality growth of the Belt, it’s necessary to bridge the divide of its upper, middle and lower reaches and establish a multi-level coordination mechanism. According to Zeng Gang, director of the Institute of Urban Development Studies at East China Normal University, the Belt is a development region as a united whole, and therefore its growth is based on the interconnectivity and coordination of different areas. Zeng suggested that a well-conceived indicator system be established to measure the level of coordinated development inside the Belt and also to evaluate the development stages and problems.

Cheng Changchun, director of the Jiangsu Yangtze Economic Belt Research Institute, said that when developing the Belt, we should fully consider the differences of areas within it, value interest sharing and compensation among provinces and cities, and establish coordination mechanisms based on common interests.

“In the Yangtze River Economic Belt, the urban innovation efficiency of the eastern region is higher than that of the central and western regions, and low innovation efficiency is mainly due to low technological efficiency,” said Deng Hongbing, a professor from the School of Economics and Management at China University of Geosciences (Wuhan). His team found that to varying degrees the levels of human capital, education input, informatization and industrialization have contributed to urban innovation.

“Emerging industries along the Belt have a high concentration of talent, sufficient human resources, advanced science and education, and a strong sense of innovation.” Deng also said that it’s important to promote the deep integration of the manufacturing and services industries with a new generation of technology represented by cloud computing, internet of things and big data. By such integration, we can create new dominant technologies and new areas of industrial growth.

Speaking of current research on the Belt, Zeng introduced some empirical research on its geographic characteristics, policy research on its construction and policy analysis and evaluation on its status. In his view, more attention needs to be paid to the complexity of the development conditions of the Belt and its internal disparities.

“Inter-regional coordination in a large-span river basin economy has always been the focus of research. Decades of research and development have led to continuous improvement in the ‘hardware’ conditions such as shipping, railway and highway. But research on ‘software’ conditions is not rich enough,” Cheng said.

He pointed out that educational and technological resources are rich along the Yangtze River, making it one of the most innovative and dynamic regions in China. In the future, the key to the integrated growth of the Belt is to do more research on technological innovation and cultural exchange, which is also a potential driving force for the upgrading of industries and the enhancement of quality and efficiency.

(Edited and translated by Shao Yijia)