Institutional advantages can help break bottlenecks in key industries

As some countries take the COVID-19 pandemic as an excuse to hype up the issue of their supply chain security or to try and reconstruct their parts of the global supply chain, it was of importance that the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee focused on improving the stability and competitiveness of Chinese industries in the global supply chain at its meeting on Friday.

As the meeting pointed out, facing the uncertainties caused by the pandemic, China must take good advantage of the strengths of its super-large-scale market, and the potential of its domestic demand by using foreign investment at home and encouraging Chinese enterprises to go out.

The multinational corporations that have been lured to China by the size of its market will not easily change their minds as long as the Chinese market remains promising. Statistics show most surveyed US and Japanese companies that have operations in China do not plan to leave the country.

Despite this, China should never waver in upgrading its industries and technology, and developing emerging industries of strategic importance to try and seize the initiative in its own hands as the withdrawal of foreign companies could seriously affect the country's status in the global supply chain.

It should be noted the upgrading of industries is not only boosted by groundbreaking innovations in some emerging industries, but also driven by breakthroughs in some traditional industries, as well as improvement of the overall industrial infrastructure.

That the meeting highlighted the latter aspect shows the decision-makers are clearheaded that innovations are by no means exclusive to pioneers in new sectors, as the traditional industries, such as iron and steel, energy and infrastructure construction, can also be cradles for trailblazers to help the industries tap into their potential of technological and management renewal.

Also, the increasing possibility of the reshuffle of the global supply chain during the pandemic should prompt Chinese enterprises to take the initiative to divert more attention from home to abroad, while climbing up the value chain in global labor division through continuously improving their technology, management and services.

As such, China can play up its institutional advantages to concentrate national resources to make breakthroughs in some bottleneck areas in key industries, such as semiconductors, special materials and biomedicine, as soon as possible so as to protect its manufacturing industries from possible foreign boycotts and sanctions.