Yang Hutao: Leveraging Strengths to Foster the Development of New Quality Productive Forces Based on Local Conditions
The Outline of the 15th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development of the People's Republic of China (hereinafter referred to as the "Outline") identifies "developing new quality productive forces in light of local conditions" as a principle that must be followed to "persist in high-quality development." It provides detailed deployments regarding the developmental momentum, formation mechanisms, key sectors, and promotional pathways for new quality productive forces. We must deeply grasp the new requirements proposed by the Outline to ensure that every region exercises its particular strengths and that these combine into a powerful momentum, thereby driving major breakthroughs in the development of new quality productive forces in light of local conditions.
The "Why": Technical Characteristics and Basic National Conditions. The Outline makes the development of new quality productive forces in light of local conditions a critical principle of high-quality development. On one hand, this stems from a judgment regarding the inherent characteristics of the new generation of technological and industrial development; on the other, it is rooted in the basic national conditions [1] of China, where factor endowments, industrial foundations, and levels of development vary significantly across regions.
The formation of new quality productive forces is a process of qualitative change in productive forces, which arises from leaps in industrial structure driven by disruptive technologies. Viewed from the perspective of technical characteristics, new quality productive forces—formed under the push of new technologies such as artificial intelligence and quantum technology—differ from the general-purpose technologies of the traditional industrial era. The release of their efficacy is highly dependent on industry-specific data resources, industrial application scenarios, and the degree of coupling with local, pre-existing industrial knowledge systems. Moreover, unlike traditional technologies which are "power-oriented" [2] and have relatively fixed input-output parameters, new quality productive forces centered on "intelligence" grow and optimize continuously through application. They rely on industrial application scenarios to gradually develop into complete systems of technological products and form complementary, symbiotic technical ecosystems within industrial networks. The industry-specific nature of data and the tacit accumulation of industrial knowledge dictate that the generation of new quality productive forces is characterized by "scenario-pull," path dependency, and local embeddedness. This means that the maturation of technologies related to new quality productive forces, as well as their industrial localization and evolution, must rely on the existing industrial substrates of various regions for differentiated exploration. This is the underlying technical logic for why new quality productive forces must be developed "in light of local conditions."
Viewed from the perspective of China's national conditions, the marked differences in factor endowments, industrial foundations, and developmental levels across regions constitute the realistic basis for "local conditions." On one hand, China's industrial structure dictates that developing new quality productive forces cannot merely consider a "lone-charge" [3] of emerging industries. For traditional industries, acting in light of local conditions means using digitalization, intellectualization, and greening as drivers to revitalize existing stocks. For strategic emerging industries and future industries, it means relying on existing industrial foundations, application scenarios, and innovation ecosystems to optimize incremental growth. On the other hand, regional endowment differences in China are significant. The eastern coastal areas possess relatively complete innovation ecosystems and high concentrations of talent and capital; they are equipped to take the lead in breaking through frontier technologies and dominating the layout of strategic emerging industries. The central regions have solid industrial foundations and vast space for manufacturing transformation, upgrading, and digital-intelligent renovation. The western regions feature lower factor costs and abundant unique resources, possessing differentiated comparative advantages in specific fields. Developing in light of local conditions allows the potential of each region to be effectively released within the national division of labor.
The Purpose: Coordinating the Overall Situation of High-Quality Development. To persist in and implement the development of new quality productive forces in light of local conditions, one must also proceed from the overall goals it serves. As a programmatic principle under the heading of "persisting in high-quality development," it directly serves a series of objectives: strengthening the domestic cycle of dual circulation, coordinating the expansion of domestic demand with the deepening of supply-side structural reform, and accelerating the cultivation of new drivers of growth. It is a key lever for promoting sustained, healthy economic development and comprehensive social progress.
First, developing new quality productive forces in light of local conditions must provide a basis for the division of labor to strengthen the domestic cycle. Stimulating the vitality of the domestic cycle depends on various regions forming differentiated comparative advantages and functional positionings within the national system of division of labor. If industrial development across regions becomes homogenized, the domestic cycle will lose complementarity and scalability due to a lack of internal exchange, potentially leading to "involutionary" [4] competition. Each region forming a differentiated path for new quality productive forces is meant to activate "division of labor dividends" at the micro level and maintain the dynamic tension between a "unified national market" and a "differentiated structure of division of labor" at the macro level.
Second, developing new quality productive forces in light of local conditions must provide structural support for coordinating the expansion of domestic demand with the deepening of supply-side structural reform. The enduring momentum for expanding domestic demand lies in the precise matching of supply and demand structures. When regions develop new quality productive forces based on their own endowments, the supply side can form a richer variety of products and technological levels, thereby connecting with different regions and levels of demand. Using new supply to create new demand and using new demand to lead new supply promotes a virtuous interaction between consumption and investment, and between supply and demand, forming a sustained momentum for endogenous circulation.
Finally, developing new quality productive forces in light of local conditions must provide diverse pathways for accelerating the cultivation of new drivers of growth. The formation of new drivers cannot be concentrated in a few regions or industries, nor can it break through along a single technological route. When regions explore paths for new quality productive forces based on their own conditions, they are essentially conducting "experiments" in cultivating new drivers on multiple tracks in parallel across the nation: some rely on manufacturing foundations to promote intelligent upgrades, some rely on scenario advantages to incubate emerging applications, and others rely on resource endowments to develop green, new-energy industries. Advancing through multiple paths simultaneously both increases the probability of new drivers emerging and enhances the overall economy's resilience against the failure of any single technological route or industrial choice.
The Pathway: Exercising Respective Strengths to Create Collective Momentum. Regarding how to develop new quality productive forces in light of local conditions, the Outline clarifies several specific pathways. The core concept is that "in light of local conditions" does not mean "each going their own way," but rather "each exercising their respective strengths to create collective momentum." Specifically, this includes the following requirements:
First, base development on existing industrial foundations. The Outline explicitly states the need to "build strategic emerging industry clusters that possess unique characteristics and complementary advantages in light of local conditions," and requires each region to "strengthen and expand characteristic advantageous industries based on functional positioning, resource endowment, and industrial foundations." This means that developing new quality productive forces is not about each region "starting a new stove" [5], but rather proceeding from existing industrial accumulation and endowment structures to form an industrial pattern of "unique characteristics and mutual complementarity" at the national level.
Second, establish scenario cultivation and openness as important pathways. In expanding emerging industries, we must "implement large-scale application demonstration actions for new technologies, new products, and new scenarios" and increase the intensity of scenario cultivation and openness. In the layout of future industries, we should encourage the exploration of multiple technological routes and typical application scenarios. For a considerable period to come, the capacity for "scenario openness" will constitute an important institutional capability for regions participating in the development of new quality productive forces. For regions with relatively limited R&D investment capabilities, systematically promoting scenario openness is likewise an effective pathway to participate in a differentiated manner.
Third, use the market-based allocation of factor reforms to open the circulation channels for development. Without the free cross-regional flow of factors, a differentiated developmental pattern would degenerate into localized optimization where each region acts independently. The Outline clarifies the deepening of market-based reforms for all factors—including land, capital, labor, technology, and data—and calls for "cultivating a unified national technical and data market." The goal is to use the free cross-regional flow of factors as a bond to aggregate the developmental momentum of different regions into a collective force for the national division of labor.
(The author is a Professor at the Institute of Economics, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences) Source: Guangming Daily (March 20, 2026) Editor: Huihui