Ye Weiwei and Wang Zhengxin: Promoting the Development of New Industries, New Models, and New Growth Drivers
Recently, General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized in his important article "Developing New Quality Productive Forces According to Local Conditions," published in the journal Qiushi, that "all localities must persist in proceeding from reality; based on their local resource endowments, industrial foundations, and scientific research conditions, they should selectively promote the development of new industries, new models, and new growth drivers. They must accelerate the transformation and upgrading of traditional industries, which serve as the fundamental pillars for economic growth, employment, and income, and promote a smooth and continuous transition between old and new growth drivers." In today's world, the tides of the technological revolution and industrial transformation are surging forward. Frontier fields such as artificial intelligence, quantum information, and biotechnology are seeing competitive breakthroughs, while traditional and emerging industries intertwine and coexist. Developing new quality productive forces according to local conditions [1] and promoting the smooth transition of growth drivers have become inevitable requirements for achieving high-quality development.
During the 14th Five-Year Plan period (2021–2025), China embarked on a new journey to comprehensively build a modern socialist country. By deeply implementing the innovation-driven development strategy and accelerating the advancement of industrial foundation upgrading and modernization of the industrial chain, positive progress has been made in the transition of growth drivers. The added value of China's high-tech manufacturing as a proportion of the added value of industrial enterprises above designated size [2] rose from 15.1% in 2020 to over 16.3% in 2024. It is expected that by the end of this year, the added value of the digital economy could reach 49 trillion yuan, accounting for 35% of GDP. Meanwhile, traditional industries have radiated new vitality through technological renovation and digital transformation. As of June 2025, the penetration rate of digital R&D and design tools and the numerical control rate of key processes in industrial enterprises reached 84% and 66.8%, respectively.
In the process of smoothly transitioning between old and new growth drivers, various regions across the country have, based on their actual conditions such as resource endowments, industrial foundations, and scientific research capabilities, formed three paths for developing new quality productive forces according to local conditions. First, regions with concentrated innovation resources are deploying new industries through high-level strategies. Beijing’s Zhongguancun targets frontier fields such as AI, quantum information, and biotechnology, gathering a group of globally influential innovative enterprises. Shanghai’s Zhangjiang Science City focuses on three "pioneer industries"—integrated circuits, biomedicine, and AI—to build world-class industrial clusters. The enterprise groups in Shenzhen’s Nanshan District, represented by high-tech firms, hold leading global positions in fields such as the internet, drones, and robotics. Hangzhou’s Yuhang District relies on the West Hangzhou Sci-Tech Innovation Corridor to construct a future industrial system centered on AI, embodied intelligence, the low-altitude economy, and brain-like intelligence. These regions with abundant scientific and technological innovation resources are seizing the "commanding heights" [3] of future industrial development by accelerating their integration into global innovation networks and promoting the deep integration of scientific and technological innovation with industrial innovation.
Second, regions where traditional industries are clustered are exploring new models while maintaining stability. Foshan in Guangdong, as the nation's largest production base for architectural ceramics, faced issues such as high energy consumption, heavy pollution, and severe homogenized competition. By vigorously constructing digital production lines, it achieved a leap from "manufacturing" to "intelligent manufacturing" (zhizao). The textile and garment industry in Qingdao, Shandong, responding to challenges like rising labor costs and changing market demands, has accelerated its transformation toward personalized customization and intelligent production, forming a new model for the transformation of traditional manufacturing. These traditional industry clusters explore new production and service models empowered by AI to drive the transformation and upgrading of traditional industries.
Finally, regions with relatively scarce innovation resources are tapping deep into their potential to accumulate new growth drivers. Shengzhou in Zhejiang Province, facing a decline in traditional sericulture (silkworm farming), chose artificial silkworm rearing technology as a breakthrough point. After tens of thousands of factor tests and formula trials, it finally achieved a disruptive innovation in artificial rearing processes. It pioneered the world’s first "full-齡 factory-mode silkworm rearing with artificial feed" [4] model, with an annual output of 40,000 tons of silkworm cocoons meeting national 5A-6A standards. This accounts for over 70% of the provincial output and is equivalent to the productivity of 400,000 traditional silkworm farmers. Bijie in Guizhou has vigorously developed the potato seed-breeding industry, establishing a complete industrial system ranging from intelligent breeding and high-quality seed reproduction to planting, processing, and sales. The annual output value of the potato industry exceeds 6 billion yuan, helping hundreds of thousands of farming households increase their income and achieve prosperity, becoming a pillar industry for local rural revitalization. These innovations have allowed resource-poor regions to solve economic development bottlenecks by digging deep into their potential.
The 15th Five-Year Plan period (2026–2030) is a critical period for laying a solid foundation and exerting full force to basically achieve socialist modernization. The torrents of technological and industrial change also provide a broad stage for various localities to develop new quality productive forces according to local conditions. At the strategic level, regions with dense innovation resources must "courageously shoulder heavy burdens" [5] and achieve greater breakthroughs in frontier technology and future industries. Traditional industrial clusters must seize opportunities to make greater progress in transformation, upgrading, and enhancing quality and efficiency. Regions with relatively scarce innovation resources must "play to their strengths and avoid weaknesses" [6] to blaze new trails in cultivating specialized and advantageous industries. At the tactical level, we must both leverage the government’s role in strategic guidance and overall coordination, and fully stimulate the innovative vitality of market entities. We must promote not only scientific and technological innovation but also institutional, management, and business model innovation. We must both cultivate and expand new growth drivers and renovate and upgrade traditional ones. We must pursue economic benefits while also taking into account social and ecological benefits. We must both attract global innovation resources and high-end talent and actively align with international advanced standards and rules, integrating into the global innovation network and industrial system at a higher level, learning and progressing through openness, enhancing capabilities through competition, and achieving win-win results through cooperation.