President Xi Jinping has called for efforts to ensure the sound development of the digital economy at a time when the country is pursuing indigenous innovation, especially in bottleneck technologies, while carrying out a campaign against monopolies and unfair competition. Xi made the remarks at a study session of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China focused on the digital economy. Digital technologies and the digital economy are a crucial area in the new round of international competition, Xi said, stressing that China must “seize the opportunities and seize the commanding heights of future development”. Xi also called for the strengthening of laws, rules and policies, as well as breakthroughs in core technologies to ensure that development of the digital economy is "firmly grasped in our own hands". He also called for efforts to prevent monopolies and the unchecked expansion of capital, noting that the legitimate rights and interests of platform employees and consumers ought to be protected. Tougher tax supervision and audit procedures were also stressed.
China was the world's second-largest digital economy with a scale nearing USD5.4 trillion in 2020, trailing the U.S. with its USD13.6 trillion digital economy, according to a white paper on the global digital economy by the China Academy of Information and Communication Technology published in August. China's digital economy was the fastest-growing last year with a yearly expansion of 9.6%, followed by Lithuania with an annual growth rate of 9.3%, according to the white paper. The study session clarified the direction of China's digital economy development, Wang Peng, Assistant Professor at the Gaoling School of Artificial Intelligence at the Renmin University of China, told the Global Times. “Supervision will be strengthened to protect personal information and data, prevent monopolies, and enable digital platforms, the digital economy and digital technology to benefit people's livelihoods and the pursuit of common prosperity,” Wang noted, as reported by the Global Times.
