by Augetto Cader Graig
Organiser of Namibia Media Professionals Union, Senior Journalist, Namibia
From the perspective of a Namibian traveling out of Africa for the first time, arriving in Chongqing is nothing short of stupendous.
Skyscrapers rise like graceful river reeds to tickle the sky, multitudes of people bustle with purpose, traffic scurries across bridges suspended high, down innumerable roads of every size and description, high-speed trains and monorails transport people while freight containers come and go like clockwork. All this while the river carries boats and ships of various descriptions, and neon coloured lights decorate buildings at night as the heat of the sun during the day echoes the immense energy that pulses through the humid air.
At the crossroads of the Silk Road Economic Belt, reviving China’s ancient tradition of international trade, and the modern Maritime Silk Road, better known as the Belt and Road Initiative, the Jianling River meets the mighty Yangtze River’s golden waterway heading east, and the China-Europe Railway Express sets off across thousands of kilometres to the west.
As a participant of the Belt and Road Journalists’ Forum 2024, the incredible opportunity to visit a few of the 26 districts, 8 counties and 4 autonomous counties under Chongqing’s jurisdiction gives new insight and brings into sharp focus the immense reality of China’s growth and development. Encompassing 82,400 square kilometres and home to more than 32 million permanent residents the “Mountain City”, also known as the “River City,” brings to life a reality that a native of the young south west Africa country of Namibia, with its population of just more than 3 million people, cannot image before experiencing.
The New International Land-Sea Trade Corridor has developed rapidly since modern China officially decided to open itself to the world in 1978, first from the eastern seaside and steadily spreading inland. Today it connects more than 100 cities in 40 countries by rail and gives access to 480 ports in 120 countries and areas through rail-sea combined transportation.
But Chongqing boasts its own more ancient history stretching back over 3000 years and in 1891 was the first inland city in China to again open to foreign trade. The Chongqing Baiheliang Underwater Museum gives access to inscriptions on the now-submerged White Crane Ridge, recording levels on the Yangtze from over 1200 years and demonstrating the city’s long tradition of technological innovation as the “world’s first ancient hydrological station.”
One example of the megacity’s current reach is found at the Chongqing Railway Container Terminal Station within the Chongqing Railway Hub, covering 36 hectares, where 702 000 freight containers (TEU) were handled last year (2023). Equipped with four 800-meter-long cargo handling lines and eight mobile gantry cranes, each able to lift 40 tons, the station can handle 850 000 TEU’s per year.
Among the huge variety of products passing through are Chongqing Fuling Zhacai Group’s iconic pickled vegetables and condiments, including the famous Zhacai pickled mustard, produced in 10 production plants with 17 automated production lines, capable of fermenting 300 000 tons of raw plant materials. According to company president Zhao Ping one plant employs only 12 individuals, thanks to high-level automation, robots and top-tier technology, but provides income to one million small-scale farmers who supply the inputs. The RMB10,098 billion company is publicly listed.
Professor Zheng Changzhong of Fu Dan University explains that Zhacai demonstrates how China has been able to officially lift almost 100 million people out of abject poverty between 2013 and 2021, when it was officially declared a thing of the past in the massive country. It is only one example of the country’s holistic effort, employing 1,4 million people and claiming the lives of 1 800 members of the ruling CPC, to implement a poverty alleviation policy specifically tailored to each of 800 counties.
Another such county is Wulong where President Xi Jinping’s 2005 statement; “Lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets,” has been put the practice to bear unprecedented fruits. Changzhong explains that the rural area was one of the poorest in China in 1997, with per capita income of only US$200 a year. The decision to support tourism development has transformed the lives of locals over 20 years of remarkable development, increasing income per citizen more than tenfold. In 2017 the district of 300 000 inhabitants was officially proclaimed as having been lifted out of poverty, with 100 00 employed in tourism development.
Secretary of the CPC for Wulong district He Qing says 67.56% forest coverage is augmented by the 2023 discovery of the Western Han Tomb number 1, to add to accolades including natural heritage site, best tourism village 2022 (UNWTO), tourism resort, tourism demonstration zone and national health care base status already achieved.
“Natural heritage is a bridge for connecting the world,” Qing says, elaborating on how ecological and environmental protection are maintained through three red lines: Ecological protection, farmland protection and urban development boundaries. He wants the district to be a land of beauty, embodied at the luxurious Fairy Mountain Resort, which was a village of only 300 inhabitants before development started. Now the region can accommodate 300 000 visitors a year, and when the high-speed railway connection is completed next year, they will be able to get there from direct domestic flights to the Xiannvshan airport in only 30 minutes. “It will be more convenient for all of you,” he said.
Changzhong says China has now embarked on a new ambition, to secure moderate prosperity for all its 1,4 billion citizens by 2050. Pilot programs have started in the South East Demonstration Zone in Zhejiang province. He says these experiences will, over the next 25 years, promote overall planning to mobilize every individual and, over several stages, bring balanced development to central and western China. Promotion of government and market forces will steadily improve and narrow imbalances between urban and rural areas through construction of public infrastructure, modernisation, technological improvements and improved governance, the academic elaborates, says Changzhong.
New energy development is key and Changzhong highlights the white paper on energy transition issued by the Chinese government on 29 August 2024. “What we need, we will develop. Obstacles, we will overcome. What the world demands, we will try our best to learn from other countries,” he says. But a visit to the Seres electric vehicle manufacturing plant in Shapingba District, Chongqing, shows that China already knows more than many other countries in the world, definitely including Namibia, where the only Peugeot assembly plant has struggled to get out the starting blocks since completion in 2019.
High technology robotic workstations now feature throughout the Seres plant, after the company started by manufacturing only a single type of seat spring in 1986. Young people dominate the production floor, attending to their robotic workstations with care and diligence to produce the company’s flagship hybrid AITO M5 vehicles, capable of accelerating from standstill to 100kmph in 4 seconds and covering 1 400km on a full tank and a fully charged battery.
All this, crammed into a packed program over only a few days, leaves three dominant fresh insights of China in mind: China’s ambition is matched only by China’s achievements; Ancient China and modern China is the same China; and the future of China is the future of the world.
*The views and opinions expressed in the articles are solely those of the individual authors and do not reflect the position of the Secretariat of the Belt and Road Journalist Network.