Promote China's industries to move towards the high-end of the global value chain (People's Forum)

Building a strong trading nation is an inherent requirement for comprehensively building a socialist modernized country and an important component of China's efforts to promote high-level opening up to the outside world. General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized the need to accelerate the construction of a strong trading nation, upgrade goods trade, innovate service trade, develop digital trade, and take digital greening as the direction to further enhance the international division of labor status and move towards the high-end of the global value chain. The outline of the 15th Five Year Plan proposes to accelerate the construction of a strong trading nation, promote the improvement of foreign trade quality and efficiency, and promote balanced development of imports and exports.

The 'strength' of a trading powerhouse is not only reflected in its large scale and wide coverage, but also in its excellent quality, high added value, strong innovation capability, and significant rule influence. It is reflected in the continuous improvement of China's industrial position in the global value chain. To implement the decisions and deployments of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, it is necessary to coordinate and grasp the construction of a strong trading nation in building a new development pattern, expanding high-level opening up to the outside world, and developing new quality productive forces, promote innovative trade development, and push China's industries to move towards the high-end of the global value chain.

Accurately grasp the theoretical logic of enhancing the global value chain position of China's industries

General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out that "we will actively participate in international division of labor and more effectively integrate into the global industrial chain, supply chain, and value chain. Currently, unilateralism and protectionism are on the rise, and the global value chain is evolving towards a comprehensive restructuring of technological systems, trade rules, green standards, digital platforms, and supply chain networks. International competition is increasingly reflected in the comprehensive competition of industrial competitiveness, supply chain resilience, and rule adaptability. Our country's industry continues to move towards the high-end of the global value chain. We need to consolidate the advantages of a complete industrial system and strong manufacturing capabilities, as well as enhance our ability to innovate, allocate resources, shape rules, and prevent risks. Coordinating domestic development requirements, adapting to changes in the international situation, and accurately grasping the main direction of building a strong trading nation can enhance the global value chain position of China's industries from the following aspects.

Promote the upgrading of trade structure towards high technology, high added value, and high quality. In the past, China's participation in global economic and trade division of labor mainly relied on cost advantages, large-scale production, and efficient delivery capabilities. Currently, China's connection with the world economy is deeper and wider. To enhance the global value chain position of China's industries, it is necessary to embed trade development more closely into the collaborative system of innovation chain, industrial chain, and supply chain, and promote the upgrading of trade structure. It should be noted that upgrading the trade structure is not just about upgrading products, but also about enhancing the value creation ability of the entire chain from core technology, advanced manufacturing to brand channels, and operation and maintenance services. China is focusing on developing new quality productive forces to promote high-quality development, which provides strong support for optimizing trade structure and building a strong trading nation. It will promote the export products to leap towards high technological content, high added value, and strong driving ability, transform scientific and technological innovation and industrial innovation achievements into new international competitive advantages, and help enhance the global value chain position of China's industries.

Enhance organizational strength and hub functionality in the global value chain. In recent years, some countries have generalized the concept of national security and promoted so-called "nearshore outsourcing", "friendly shore outsourcing", "risk reduction", etc., leading to an increase in the risk of fragmentation in the global industrial and supply chains, highlighting the indispensable role of intermediate goods as a link between upstream and downstream. Intermediate goods trade is an important indicator for measuring a country's depth of integration into the global production network and its ability to organize value chains, and it is also an important support for promoting China's foreign trade growth. China has a complete industrial system, strong industrial supporting capabilities, and a super large market, making it an important hub node with significant influence in the global production network. Transforming the advantages of China's complete industrial system into a stable supply capacity for key intermediate goods, core components, advanced basic materials, industrial software, and high-end equipment, and into organizational, configuration, and support capabilities for the global production network, can firmly grasp the initiative of value chain development.

Shaping new advantages in trade competition driven by digitalization and greening. With the accelerated evolution of a new round of technological revolution and industrial transformation, digital greening is profoundly changing the competitive logic of international trade. Digital technology reshapes trade partners, trade modes, and trade organizational forms, continuously expanding trade boundaries through cross-border e-commerce, cloud services, cross-border data services, intelligent supply chains, and more; Green and low-carbon transformation reshapes product competition standards and market access conditions, with carbon footprint, green certification, environmental standards, and supply chain traceability becoming new competitive variables. The future trade competition is not only price competition, but also comprehensive competition in digital platforms, green standards, supply chain services, and so on. China has strong advantages in areas such as digital economy and green manufacturing. Accelerating the transformation of these advantages into trade form advantages, industrial ecological advantages, and international competitive advantages, improving trade efficiency and expanding trade space through digitization, enhancing product competitiveness, rule adaptability, and sustainable development capabilities through greening, can not only broaden the space for trade development, but also shape new advantages for China's industries in the global value chain.

Enhance the ability to shape international economic and trade rules in expanding institutional openness. Currently, international economic and trade rules are extending from border measures to post border measures, and from goods trade rules to service trade, digital trade, green trade, intellectual property, competition policy, government procurement, supply chain security, and other fields. In this context, international trade competition is increasingly reflected in the competition of standards, rules, compliance capabilities, and supply chain transparency. To enhance the global value chain position of China's industries, we need to not only continue to consolidate the core competitiveness of China's manufacturing industry, but also steadily expand institutional openness in rules, regulations, management, standards, and actively participate in the formulation of international rules in emerging fields such as artificial intelligence, digital economy, and green low-carbon, and promote China's transformation from a rule adaptor to a rule participant and shaper. This is conducive to transforming China's huge foreign trade volume advantage into a stable international division of labor position and global value chain governance advantage.

The continuous cultivation of new driving forces for the development of foreign trade in the new era has helped China's industries climb the global value chain position

In recent years, facing a complex and severe external environment, China's foreign trade has been pushed forward steadily and improved in quality. The scale, structure, format, and vitality of trade have synchronously increased, and the competitive advantage of trade has been further consolidated. New driving forces for foreign trade development have been continuously cultivated, laying a solid foundation for China's industry to move towards the high-end of the global value chain.

The advantage of trade scale continues to consolidate, and the position of a global trading power is more stable. The scale of trade is an important foundation for building a strong trading nation. During the 14th Five Year Plan period, China's cumulative import and export scale exceeded 200 trillion yuan, continuing to maintain its position as the world's largest country in goods trade; From January to May 2026, the total import and export value of China's goods trade reached 20.68 trillion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 15.3%. This fully demonstrates China's strong ability to resist fluctuations and growth resilience in the face of intensified global trade frictions and rising geopolitical risks. It is a long-term advantage jointly shaped by a complete industrial system, efficient supply chain system, and diversified market layout.

The export product structure continues to optimize, and the technological content and added value continue to increase. In recent years, China's export products have accelerated their upgrading towards high-tech, high value-added, green and low-carbon directions. The average annual growth rate of high-tech product imports and exports from 2021 to 2025 is 7.9%. In 2025, the export scale of "new three types" products (new energy vehicles, lithium batteries, photovoltaic products) will increase by 3.5 times compared to 2020. At the same time, service trade has steadily expanded and its structure has been optimized. By 2025, the total import and export volume of services will reach 8.08 trillion yuan, an increase of 7.4% over the previous year, and the export of knowledge intensive services will reach 1.83 trillion yuan, an increase of 10.5% over the previous year. The competitiveness of service exports has significantly improved. Optimizing the export product structure supports China's industry to leap towards high value-added links in the global value chain.

Trade models are accelerating innovation, and new driving forces for foreign trade development are constantly increasing. The competitiveness of an industry depends not only on what it sells, but also on how it sells. With the decrease in the proportion of processing trade and the increase in the proportion of general trade, more and more foreign trade enterprises are shifting from simple OEM production to independent research and development, independent design, independent branding, and independent channel construction to enhance product added value, promoting the rapid growth of new business models such as cross-border e-commerce, overseas warehouses, and bonded maintenance. By 2025, China's cross-border e-commerce imports and exports will increase by nearly 70% compared to 2020. The innovative development of digital finance, online education, remote healthcare and other business models has accelerated the digital empowerment of the entire trade chain. These new business models are driving the expansion of China's foreign trade from "product going global" to "industry chain going global" and "brand going global".

The competitiveness of independent brands has been enhanced, and the position of private enterprises as the main force in foreign trade development is increasingly consolidated. The export growth of independent brand products is an important indicator for observing the improvement of China's global value chain position in the industry. By 2025, the export of China's independent brand products will increase by 12.9%, accounting for 1.4 percentage points of the total export value. More and more enterprises will no longer just embed themselves in the processing and manufacturing links of the global production network, but will have more control over product definition, technological routes, brand premiums, sales channels, and user services. By 2025, the proportion of private enterprises in China's total import and export value will increase to 57.3%, continuing to play the role of the "main engine" of foreign trade. The role of Chinese enterprises in the global value chain is expanding from simple producers to organizers, brand owners, and solution providers, significantly enhancing their resource integration, industry leadership, and global control over the global value chain.

An important focus of promoting China's industries to move towards the mid to high end of the global value chain during the 15th Five Year Plan period

General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out: "We will promote the optimization and upgrading of goods trade, innovate the development mechanism of service trade, develop digital trade, and accelerate the construction of a strong trading country." We must adhere to Xi Jinping's economic thought as a guide, follow the strategic deployment of the "15th Five Year Plan" outline, firmly expand high-level opening up to the outside world, and continuously enhance the competitiveness, influence, and initiative of China's industries in the global industrial chain, supply chain, and value chain while accelerating the pace of building a strong trading country and further consolidating its position as a major trading country.

Optimize and upgrade the trade of goods. Goods trade is the fundamental foundation of building a strong trading nation and an important carrier for China to participate in the division of labor in the global value chain. To optimize and upgrade goods trade, promote the upgrading of export products towards high-tech, high value-added, and strong driving capabilities. Consolidate traditional advantages in mechanical and electrical products, equipment manufacturing, etc., enhance product quality, brand influence, international competitiveness, and after-sales service level. Focus on cultivating new quality productivity, support the expansion of international markets for high-tech products, green and low-carbon products, etc. Guide processing trade to extend from assembly processing to high value-added links such as research and development design, quality inspection, operation and maintenance, green remanufacturing, and supply chain management, and enhance support for the global production network. Promote the integrated development of domestic and foreign trade, and better connect the domestic circulation with the international circulation. We will deepen high-quality economic and trade cooperation to jointly build the "the Belt and Road" and promote the integrated development of trade and investment.

Promote a leap in trade patterns. This is conducive to shaping new advantages in international cooperation and competition, and promoting the industry to move towards the high-end of the global value chain. We should vigorously develop service trade, promote the integration of service trade with modern service industry, high-end manufacturing industry, and modern agriculture, develop knowledge intensive service trade, and cultivate a group of internationally competitive R&D design, industrial design, digital services, cultural services, and professional service brands. Innovatively developing digital trade, orderly expanding the opening up of the digital field, optimizing the layout and functions of overseas warehouses, and promoting the safe and orderly flow of cross-border data while maintaining the bottom line of data security. Expand green trade, expand the export of green terminal products, enhance the supply capacity of green products, and strengthen China's standard influence and rule discourse power in the field of green and low-carbon.

Enhance the ability to shape rules and prevent risks. Institutional openness is an important support for building a strong trading nation. To expand opening up in line with international high standard economic and trade rules, promote the compatibility of domestic and international rules, regulations, management, and standards, and focus on key areas such as intellectual property protection, green and low-carbon standards, cross-border payment settlement, electronic standardization of documents, government procurement, and fair competition, accelerate the formation of institutional and regulatory systems that are compatible with high-level opening up to the outside world. Give full play to the pioneering role of major cooperation platforms, and conduct integrated explorations in areas such as cross-border service trade, digital trade, intellectual property protection, green and low-carbon standards, and innovative customs supervision. Fully and deeply participate in the reform of the World Trade Organization, promote the reform of the global economic governance system, guide the rational and orderly cross-border layout of industrial and supply chains, and enhance the ability to maintain the security and stability of industrial and supply chains and safeguard national economic security in expanding opening up.