The Economic Summit of the China Development Forum 2018 started on March 24. In the first plenary session on the morning of the first day, themed “A New Agenda for the World Economy,” experts discussed challenges, such as growing trade tensions, facing the global economy. The also talked about China’s policies to improve the quality of its economic expansion, reduce debt and control financial risks.

This session was hosted by Yu Bin, Director-General of the General Office of the Development Research Center of the State Council. The speakers are: Wang Yiming, Vice President (Vice Minister) of the Development Research Center of the State Council; Pascal Lamy, former Director-General of the World Trade Organization; Zhu Guangyao, Vice Minister of Finance; and Li Yang, President of the National Institution for Finance & Development and Former Vice President of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

Wang said the high-quality growth China is pursuing will see the country shift its focus from expansion in size to structural upgrading, and from factor-driven to innovation-driven expansion. Such a transformation means the economy needs to provide new products and services to meet higher consumer demand, improve the added-value that products provide, and move upward on the industrial value chain by promoting science and technology innovation and increasing human capital.