We will comprehensively strengthen infrastructure development

Strengthening infrastructure construction is a major and urgent task

Since the founding of New China, China's infrastructure system (including public service capabilities such as education and health care) has made great progress and achieved great achievements. The ability to guarantee production and life has basically achieved leapfrog development from scratch. However, there are still many shortcomings in infrastructure construction, which have formed prominent constraints on the improvement of production and living conditions, and have formed many obstacles to the change of the structure of urban and rural areas, industry and agriculture. In the face of the second centenary goal of building a great modern socialist country in an all-round way and the people's ever-growing needs for a better life, we must start the modern infrastructure construction project as soon as possible.

The problem of unbalanced and inadequate development of China's comprehensive transportation is still prominent. The layout of the comprehensive transportation network is not balanced, the structure is not reasonable, and the connection is not smooth enough, and the intercity and urban (suburban) railways in key urban agglomerations and metropolitan areas have obvious shortcomings. Industrial chain supply chain support capacity is insufficient. Flood control capacity, agricultural water-saving irrigation, urban water supply and drainage, water-saving projects, etc., still need to be strengthened, and water security risk prevention and control, water resources carrying capacity improvement, water ecological environment protection and other basic capacity building tasks are heavy. The layout planning of urban underground space lags behind, and the construction of underground space facilities, especially underground pipe network facilities, lags behind significantly. The urban waterlogging problem is prominent, and the safety accidents caused by the aging of underground pipelines increase significantly. Problems such as insufficient capacity of urban solid waste classification and treatment facilities, unbalanced regional development, hidden environmental risks of landfill facilities, and imperfect management systems and mechanisms are still prominent. China's energy security capability still needs to be comprehensively strengthened, and its energy clean utilization capacity still needs to be comprehensively improved. To sum up, China's infrastructure system still has many shortcomings and many hidden risks, which restricts the guarantee and improvement of people's livelihood. It restricts the improvement of agricultural production capacity, the development of modern industrial system and logistics system, and the guarantee of industrial chain and supply chain. In order to stabilize growth and ensure people's livelihood, the capacity of the infrastructure system must be improved at a faster pace.

The unbalanced development of China's infrastructure system (including public service capacity) is a prominent weak link that restricts the promotion of new urbanization. The responsibility for building infrastructure systems (including public service capacity) is mainly borne by governments at all levels. Therefore, the comprehensive financial resources, which are restricted by factors such as administrative level and economic development level, determine the level of construction and development of each city's infrastructure system (including public service capacity). Those big cities with high administrative level and high level of economic development, such as Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen, have a relatively high level of infrastructure system construction and development (including public service capacity). In the large cities located in the east and south (including quasi-first-tier cities and second-tier cities), the construction and development level of the infrastructure system (including public service capacity) is generally higher than that of similar cities in the west and north. In general, the first - and second-tier cities are higher than the third - and fourth-tier small and medium-sized cities. This pattern has seriously restricted the development of small and medium-sized cities and the formation of urban agglomerations that complement the functions of large cities (central cities). 

The constraints on the development of western and northern urban agglomerations are more serious, and all kinds of enterprises in small and medium-sized cities strongly reflect that there are serious difficulties in the introduction of talents at different levels, mainly reflected in the obvious lack of public service guarantee ability such as education and medical care. Recruiting talents from big cities and central cities such as Xi 'an, Wuhan and Shenzhen, and the difficulties and problems encountered in the process of transferring talents to small and medium-sized cities are more prominent. Some companies have to set up research and development institutions in places like Shenzhen. If this problem is not solved, it will be difficult for the new type of urbanization with urban agglomeration as the main model to move forward smoothly. The process of new industrialization, urbanization and agricultural modernization will be hindered, and the potential for structural change on which China's medium - and long-term economic development mainly depends will not be fully released. Therefore, accelerating the construction of an urban infrastructure system (including public service capacity) with a reasonable layout, comprehensive guarantee and generally consistent level is of great significance for the smooth promotion of new urbanization and the full release of the medium - and long-term development potential of China's economy.

Infrastructure must have a long-term goal. In the long run, the level of economic development and social civilization and progress achieved by socialism with Chinese characteristics will certainly be unprecedented, and this is also a solid foundation for the ultimate victory of the socialist system. Therefore, the vision of the construction of China's infrastructure system (including public service capacity) must lead the future era, and be able to guarantee long-term high standards and high levels. In the historical period after the founding of New China, all aspects of China's economic construction gave way to the foundation of industrialization, and the construction of infrastructure system (including public service capacity) lagged behind. After the reform and opening up, the economy has experienced sustained and rapid growth, and the construction of the infrastructure system (including public service capacity) is generally a "catch-up" development. The construction pattern dominated by local and urban governments has made the problem of unbalanced construction of the infrastructure system (including public service capacity) more prominent. At present, there is still a significant gap between China's infrastructure system (including public service capacity) and the world's major developed countries in terms of the rationality of the overall and long-term layout, the quality, full coverage and the same level of service guarantee. Compared with the goal of socialist modernization in our country, there is a bigger gap. We must have a strong sense of urgency and a spirit of lasting success. We must adhere to a people-centered development philosophy and a problem-oriented and goal-oriented approach. We must balance development and security, make systematic planning and coordinated efforts, accurately address weaknesses and strengths, improve the layout, structure, functions and development model of infrastructure, and mobilize all social forces to build a comprehensive modern infrastructure system. We will build socialist modern infrastructure projects.

Strengthening infrastructure construction in an all-round way is a key way to expand domestic demand

The contraction of demand is one of the important reasons for China's economic downturn. Strengthening infrastructure construction in an all-round way can effectively alleviate the contraction of demand in our country. Affected by the international financial crisis, the Sino-US trade war and other factors, China's export growth rate has dropped significantly. From 2010 to 2019, dollar export growth slowed from 31% to 0.5%. Affected by China's unbalanced economic development, especially the unbalanced promotion of urbanization, the growth rate of real estate investment has declined sharply. Big cities are overpopulated and small and medium-sized cities are underpopulated. It is difficult to get land in big cities and sell houses in small and medium-sized cities, which seriously restricts the development of real estate. From 2010 to 2015, real estate investment growth slowed from 33% to 1%. Because of the extensive and close relationship between real estate construction and manufacturing, it also caused a sharp decline in manufacturing investment. Between 2011 and 2016, the growth rate of manufacturing investment slowed from 30% to 2.8%. Real estate investment, together with manufacturing investment, accounts for about 50% of total investment, and its growth rate has declined sharply, which will inevitably lead to a significant decline in investment growth. From 2010 to 2016, the growth rate of fixed asset investment dropped from 23.8 percent to 7.9 percent. The decline in export and investment growth has significantly reduced business orders and reduced the operating rate, which in turn has reduced the economic growth rate. The accompanying decline in the growth rate of business income and resident income has led to a decline in the growth rate of consumption. From 2010 to 2016, the growth rate of retail sales of consumer goods dropped from 18.4 percent to 10.4 percent. This has formed a vicious circle of insufficient demand, reduced orders, reduced economic growth, reduced income growth in all aspects, and contracted demand, which has made China's economic growth rate continue to fall back. From 2010 to 2019, the growth rate of gross domestic product (GDP) dropped from 10.3% to 6%. Since 2020, the impact of the COVID-19 epidemic has further aggravated the contraction of demand. In response to the new downward pressure on China's economy in 2021, the Central Economic Work Conference pointed out that the current Chinese economy is facing three pressures: demand contraction, supply shock, and weakening expectations. The contraction of demand has become a prominent contradiction restricting the recovery of our economy. To deal with this problem of long accumulation time and strong internal convergence, we must take effective measures to actively expand demand. In the face of unprecedented changes in the world in a century and an unprecedented complex external environment, expanding demand must be based on domestic, we must rely on China's super-large domestic market. Therefore, expanding domestic demand is the key strategic arrangement to cope with the contraction of demand. There are two choices to expand domestic demand: first, consumption first or investment first; Second, whether people and enterprises should take the lead or the government should take the lead is a choice we must make to ensure steady employment and growth.

Consumption is the fundamental purpose and basic driving force of social production. The expansion of consumption requires the support of employment and personal income improvement, and the improvement of enterprises' ability to improve product quality and innovation. Therefore, the work of expanding consumption must be done on the production and supply side. To make production and supply active, we must work on improving production capacity and increasing product orders, which must rely on investment. On the one hand, investment can promote scientific and technological innovation and improve the production capacity of enterprises; On the other hand, it can increase various kinds of procurement activities and increase the orders of related enterprises. Consumption and investment are two important links which are interrelated and mutually conditional in the social reproduction movement. Social reproduction is, first of all, material production, which is the prerequisite for the existence of other related links such as consumption. Investment is the basic means to support the development and expansion of material production capacity. Without sustained and effective investment, the maintenance and improvement of material production capacity cannot be achieved, nor can the construction and renewal of various material living conditions (such as cities and villages) be achieved. Investment can promote active production activities, while supporting the growth of supply, it will also support the increase of employment and household income, which will prepare the necessary consumer demand conditions for the increase of supply. This is also an important manifestation of supply creating demand. Marx paid special attention to the dialectical and unified analysis of the relationship between production and consumption, and regarded them as two closely related and interdependent links in the system movement. Without production, there can be no consumption, but without consumption, there can be no production. "But productive activity is the starting point of realization, and therefore the dominant element of realization." This reminds us that if we do not promote production activity and supply growth through effective investment, we will have a series of problems by relying on stimulating consumption; For example, if the expansion of money issuance directly increases the purchasing power of residents, the result may be that when production and supply have not increased, people do not engage in related labor but increase their income, and consumer demand expands, which may become an important incentive for inflation. To expand domestic demand, we must give full play to the key role of investment. 

We must increase effective investment to stimulate production and supply, generate employment and income growth, and boost consumption.

To expand domestic demand, we must give play to the role of the government. The contraction of demand is one of the possible trends of market adjustment. Under market regulation, enterprises pursue profit growth and residents pursue income growth. Market demand is one of the key factors determining profit and revenue growth. When some factors make the demand decline, thus reducing the opportunity for profit and employment and income growth, enterprises will prudently arrange production and investment, and residents will prudently arrange consumption expenditure, and the related demand will converge. This reinforces the contraction in demand, making it a self-reinforcing trend. The government can act against the contraction of market demand by freeing itself from the constraints of accounting for short-term benefits such as current investment returns. The counter-cyclical regulation of government macro policy is an indispensable supplement to market regulation. To expand domestic demand, we must give full play to the role of the government. We must be driven by government investment, so that business investment and social investment can pick up in an all-round way, and in turn, employment and consumption can gradually recover. Infrastructure system (including public service facilities) is a public product mainly responsible by the government, in response to the contraction of demand, to expand domestic demand, comprehensive strengthening of infrastructure construction will inevitably become the key.

To comprehensively strengthen infrastructure construction, we must have sufficient funds, technology, materials and construction capacity

Adequate financial security. Infrastructure systems (including public service capabilities) have strong attributes of public goods and are related to the overall and long-term development needs. Its project construction, can not be overly biased to short-term investment income accounts and debt balance accounts. As pointed out at the 11th meeting of the Financial and Economic Commission of the CPC Central Committee, we must pay attention to efficiency, calculate both economic accounts and comprehensive accounts, and improve the comprehensive benefits of the whole life cycle of infrastructure. First of all, the value and use value of the two aspects of the account. We should not only pay attention to the reasonable recovery of project construction investment, but also pay attention to the service guarantee ability of the whole life cycle provided by the project, pay attention to its benefit to the people's life and ensure the long-term level. For example, the investment in high-speed rail construction is large and the payback period is long. However, we must not deny the timeliness and necessity of high-speed rail project construction. It is necessary to pay special attention to the convenience and convenience brought by high-speed rail to the people's travel, pay attention to the quality improvement of China's transportation level, and pay attention to the long-term sustained service guarantee ability. The construction of related projects of infrastructure system (including public service capacity) must comprehensively assess the comprehensive benefits of value and use value, and calculate the input-output ratio accordingly. It is necessary to pay attention to the public product attributes of the project and pay attention to its different degrees of public welfare, which determines that the construction funds must be jointly undertaken by the government and the society. At present, China's infrastructure system (including public service capacity) construction funds are sufficient. First, the fundamentals of the Chinese economy are sound in the long run, the credit foundation of the Chinese government is highly reliable, and the potential for sustained and rapid growth of fiscal revenue is highly reliable. Therefore, the government has a lot of room to raise funds by issuing long-term construction bonds. Second, the scale of social funds is huge and the investment channels are relatively narrow, and the participation of government investment projects is very enthusiastic, and the potential of mobilizing social funds to participate in infrastructure construction is great. The medium - and long-term financial funds that can be mobilized are huge, and the current social funds that can be mobilized are huge, ensuring adequate construction funds.

Sufficient materials, technology and construction capacity. After long-term development, China's output of more than 220 industrial products such as steel and cement ranks first in the world, and the huge potential for capacity expansion has provided sufficient material support for the construction of infrastructure systems. After long-term exercise, China's construction capacity has reached a high level in the world, and the potential construction production capacity of a number of large construction enterprises such as China Construction and China Railway Construction needs to be fully brought into play. Construction related technologies continue to innovate and break through, and some major key technologies are also relying on the new national system to speed up research. On the whole, there are sufficient guarantees for comprehensively strengthening the material, technology and construction capacity of infrastructure construction.

The work policy of ensuring stability and seeking progress while maintaining stability requires us to maintain our focus and unleash unprecedented development potential. To this end, we must, in accordance with the arrangements of the 11th Meeting of the Financial and Economic Commission of the CPC Central Committee and the requirements of the meeting of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, make every effort to strengthen the construction of the infrastructure system, effectively and effectively expand domestic demand, stabilize growth, and ensure people's livelihood.