NANTONG—On June 18, the Seminar on Implementing Regional Coordinated Development Strategy in the New Era, hosted by the Jiangsu Yangtze River Economic Belt Research Institute at Nantong University, was held in Nantong, Jiangsu Province, via online and offline channels. Scholars discussed ways to further improve the level of coordinated regional development in China.

Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, China’s regional coordinated development has made remarkable achievements, regional gaps and urban-rural gaps in development have gradually narrowed, equalization levels for basic public services have been continuously enhanced, and transportation infrastructure has been more accessible and balanced. However, China still sees such problems as unbalanced, uncoordinated, insufficient, and unsustainable regional development. As such, it is urgent to deepen the research on regional coordinated development strategies.

Yang Fenghua, executive vice president of the Jiangsu Yangtze River Economic Belt Research Institute of Nantong University, said that since the reform and opening up, economic take-off and rapid development has been accompanied with the problem of unbalanced and uncoordinated regional development.

Uncertainties facing coordinated regional development are increasing in the new era, and the contradiction among the economy, society, and natural ecology is more prominent, thus regional research needs to further strengthen coordination, balance, and symbiosis, said Xu Changle, former executive vice president of the Yangtze River Basin Development Research Institute at East China Normal University.

Chen Wenling, chief economist of the China Center for International Economic Exchanges, said that construction of a series of deployments such as state-level new areas, free trade zones, and comprehensive bonded zones represents a strategic layout not only for developing the regional economy, but also for deepening opening up and optimizing the combination of factors of production.

The digital economy plays an important role in regional coordinated development. Wang Jinjie, director of the Internet and Innovation Economy Research Center at Nankai University, suggested that the digital economy should be placed within the framework of coordinated regional development, and construction of digital infrastructure should be leveraged to promote coordinated regional development. Digital economy policies should be combined with regional development strategies, while leveraging the role of key production factors, such as data and digital technology, within regional coordinated development.

Wu Xiaohua, deputy director of the National Development and Reform Commission’s Macroeconomic Research Institute, said that regional development strategies should solve the problem of coordinating development between the north and the south. In addition, “we must also consider how to coordinate development and security issues.”

Yang believes that in the stage of high-quality economic development, with comprehensive and in-depth implementation of the regional coordinated development strategy, development differences among regions will gradually narrow, and regional development will thus move towards a pattern of common prosperity.