Representatives from government departments, financial institutions and technology companies brainstormed tech-savvy high-quality development at the ongoing 2024 Financial Street Forum Annual Meeting in Beijing on Friday.
Guests attending the forum agreed that sci-tech innovation is the most important feature of new productive forces and high-quality development. It is necessary to build a financial system that is compatible with sci-tech innovation, strengthen support for major national sci-tech tasks and tech-savvy small and medium-sized enterprises, and strengthen the ecological interaction between the primary market and the secondary market of sci-tech enterprises.
"A better secondary market for sci-tech companies can provide an exit channel for venture capital and a bottom support guarantee for patient capital. For the secondary stock market, it is very important to attract investors to invest in the field of sci-tech innovation," Huang Zhuo, vice dean of the National School of Development of Peking University, said at the forum.
At the forum, relevant government departments vow to play full guiding role of government investment and focus investment on innovation and core technology.
"We will introduce more reform measures that meet the needs and expectations of sci-tech innovation enterprises, especially tech-savvy SMEs. We will give full play to the role of the government's industrial venture capital guidance fund, and promote the smooth flow of various advantageous production factors to fields of sci-tech innovation and new quality productive forces," said Liu Dongwei, mayor of Xicheng District of Beijing.
Founded in 2012, the Financial Street Forum has been successfully held for 11 years. Seen as the bellwether of China's financial reform and development, it has been upgraded to a state-level and international industry forum since 2020, and become an important platform for the country's opening up and development.
The Beijing Financial Street (BFS), formed in 1993, is dubbed "China's Wall Street" and the "brain" of the country's financial sector.
Financial Street Forum spotlights tech-savvy high-quality development
Chinese President Xi Jinping's New Year message delivered on the New Year Eve has drawn positive responses from scholars and former officials from several countries, who say that the series of global initiatives proposed by Xi have provided fresh momentum for multilateralism and shared development at a time of growing uncertainty.
While the reactions touched on the broader vision outlined in Xi's New Year message, they also focused on the initiatives Xi has put forward over recent years, particularly the Global Development Initiative, the Global Security Initiative, the Global Civilization Initiative and the newly proposed Global Governance Initiative.
Highlighting the significant importance of these initiatives, they have emphasized the need for equality, inclusiveness and a fairer international order.
"We need a more just international order and a truly multilateral system. China stands almost alone today as a global force actively advancing genuine multilateralism. Therefore, these initiatives are most welcome," said Michael Schumann, chairman of the German Federal Association for Economic Development and Foreign Trade.
Former Lebanese Prime Minister Hassan Diab has placed the emphasis on dialogue and trust-building between civilizations.
"It is essential now more than ever to promote communication and understanding between China and the world to enhance cultural exchanges and build mutual trust. As President Xi has repeatedly emphasized, China supports principles of unity, inclusiveness and peacefulness. These values should guide our collective efforts to build bridges rather than walls," he said.
From a governance perspective, Russian scholar Ekaterina Zaklyazminskaya, head of the Center for World Politics and Strategic Analysis at the Institute of China and Modern Asia under the Russian Academy of Sciences, has viewed the Global Governance Initiative as a structured response to global challenges.
"The recently proposed Global Governance Initiative presents a comprehensive framework of ideas. It prioritizes establishing a more just international order, champions multilateralism, and upholds the principle of 'people first.' Through its concrete practices, financial assistance, and tangible support for multilateral bodies like the U.N., China has demonstrated that its commitments are substantive. China is taking tangible steps toward a fairer and more reasonable global governance system," she said.
Scholars from the Global South also have seen historical echoes in the initiatives.
"Some of the developed and developing countries have highly welcomed the Global Development Initiative, because this initiative emphasizes the need for partnerships -- partnerships that commit resources to end global poverty and pursue common and shared development. The Global Governance Initiative, in my view, echoes again the call that was made by Asian [and] African countries at the Bandung Conference in 1955 for equality, for mutual respect, for respect of territorial integrity, [and] for respect of sovereignty," said Bongani Maimele, director of international relations at South Africa's National School of Government.
"These initiatives are revolutionary in nature. They are reshaping the political philosophy of global governance. Today's world is far more complex than it was 80 years ago, and interdependence among nations has deepened. Therefore, we need new philosophical perspectives to examine our world and new models of engagement to foster a new type of international relations," said Sheradil Baktygulov, director of Kyrgyzstan's Institute of World Policy.
Int'l scholars praise Xi's initiatives, call for stronger multilateralism
