The Nepal Weekly 
October 18, 2022
The Communist Party of China (CPC) on Sunday unveiled its blueprint for building a modern socialist China in all respects for the next five years and beyond as the 20th CPC National Congress was inaugurated.
The five-yearly meeting is the first national congress of the CPC after observing its centenary in 2021, when the Party led the Chinese people to complete building a moderately prosperous society in all respects.
“From this day forward, the central task of the CPC will be to lead the Chinese people of all ethnic groups in a concerted effort to realize the Second Centenary Goal of building China into a great modern socialist country in all respects and to advance the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation on all fronts through a Chinese path to modernization,” remarked President Xi Jinping at the opening session of the congress.
He asked all CPC members to never forget the original aspiration and founding mission and to have the courage and ability to carry on the fight.
Xi hailed the great transformation in the first decade of the new era as “a milestone in the history of the Party, of the People’s Republic of China, of reform and opening up, of the development of socialism, and of the development of the Chinese nation.”
The CPC embraced its centenary, ushered in a new era of socialism with Chinese characteristics, and eradicated absolute poverty and finished building a moderately prosperous society in all respects, thus completing the First Centenary Goal, he said, calling the three major events “historic feats.”
China’s GDP has come to account for 18.5 per cent of the world economy, up 7.2 percentage points over the past one decade. The world’s second largest economy has become a major trading partner for over 140 countries and regions, leading the world in total volume of trade in goods.
China has also joined the ranks of the world’s innovators with breakthroughs in some core technologies in key fields. With its people-centered philosophy of development, the country has built the largest education, social security, and health care systems around the globe.
As a collaborative endeavour, the Belt and Road Initiative has been welcomed by the international community both as a public good and a cooperation platform.
Other great achievements highlighted by Xi range from comprehensively deepening reform to advancing the critical battle against pollution.
The world’s most populous country is walking on a model of modernization that has not been seen earlier. In his report, Xi reaffirmed that Chinese modernization is the socialist modernization pursued under the leadership of the CPC.
Chinese modernization is the modernization of a huge population, of common prosperity for all, of material and cultural-ethical advancement, of harmony between humanity and nature and of peaceful development, he pointed out, adding that it offers humanity “a new choice” for achieving modernization.
In its two-step strategic plan, the CPC aims to basically realize socialist modernization from 2020 through 2035 and build China into a great modern socialist country that is prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced, harmonious, and beautiful from 2035 through the middle of this century.
Xi expounded on China’s overall development objectives for the year 2035, which include substantially growing the per capita GDP to be on par with that of a mid-level developed country, significantly enhancing national soft power, steadily lowering carbon emissions after reaching a peak as well as comprehensively strengthening the national security system and capabilities. “The next five years will be crucial for getting our efforts to build a modern socialist country in all respects off to a good start,” Xi noted.
