Ningxia: 70 years on

Editor’s Note: Starting in May, the State Council Information Office has been organizing news conferences for each province, autonomous region and municipality to give briefings about their social and economic development since the founding of New China 70 years ago.

During the Ningxia session held August 30 in Beijing, Shi Taifeng, secretary of the CPC Ningxia Hui autonomous region Committee, and Xian Hui, deputy secretary of the committee and governor of the region, talked about Ningxia’s development with reporters.

Economic growth

Ningxia Hui autonomous region’s GDP has increased by a factor of 3,278 since the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, and totaled 370.5 billion yuan in 2018. The region has established a modern industrial system including chemical processing of coal, new energy and equipment manufacturing as well as sprawling networks of transportation, water supply and telecommunications, which is a leap-frog development from scratch 70 years ago. Hedong airport in Yinchuan, the capital of Ningxia, handled nine million passenger trips in 2018 and a new high-speed railway connecting Yinchuan and Xi’an, Shaanxi province’s capital, is expected to open in 2020.

People’s living standards

The income of urban and rural residents has changed greatly in the past 70 years, especially since the reform and opening-up. The per capita disposable income of urban and rural residents in 2018 was 31,895 yuan and 11,708 yuan. The per capita living space of urban and rural residents last year was 34 square meters and 29.3 square meters. In 2018, the number of cars owned by every 100 urban and rural residents in Ningxia was 42.8 and 32 respectively.

From 1982 to 2018, 3.4 million people, or half of the people living in Ningxia, were lifted out of poverty. Meanwhile, 1.3 million people were relocated from impoverishedmountainousareas to places with more arable land and better water supply. In addition, every county in Ningxia has its own library and cultural center.

Opening-up

Ningxia has simplified government approval and implemented a series of reforms of state-owned enterprises and agricultural and rural issues. More than 80 percent of government service is provided online. The time needed to start a business in Ningxia was shortened to 5 days from the previous average of 20 days. Currently, the private economy takes up over half of the region’s economy and contributes to 53.2 percent of its economic growth. As an important strategic stronghold along the Belt and Road, Ningxia has economic and trade cooperation with more than 130 countries and regions.

Living environment

The quality of the ecological environment in the Ningxia Hui autonomous region has also changed greatly. Ningxia has been promoting land greening and watershed management and combating desertification. The afforestation rate in the region increased to 14.6 percent last year from 1.5 percent when New China was founded 70 years ago.