Changes in Guiyang over Past 70 Years: Economic Aggregate for One Day of 2018 Equivalent to That for Whole Year of 1978

"Since the founding of the People's Republic of China 70 years ago, Guiyang has been playing a leading role as the "engine" and "locomotive" in the economic and social development of the province." This was recently generalized by Chen Yan, Deputy Secretary of the CPC Guiyang Municipal Committee and Mayor of Guiyang, at the seventh session of the press conference series for Guizhou Province to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China with the theme of "magnificent 70 years, struggle in a new era," when he talked about the economic and social development of Guiyang over the past 70 years since the founding of New China.

According to Mayor Chen, in 1949, the gross production of Guiyang City was only 14.67 million yuan (prices for the indicated year). In 1978, at the beginning of the reform and opening up, the city's economic aggregate for the whole year was only 1.077 billion yuan. After the reform and opening up, especially in the 1990s, the city's economic aggregate continued to rise. In 1994, it exceeded 10 billion yuan, and in 2010, it surpassed 100 billion, each spanning 16 years to achieve a new milestone. In 2013, the figure came to 200 billion, and in 2016, it hit 300 billion yuan - it took only three years to reach each of the new milestones. In 2018, the city's economic aggregate hit 379.845 billion yuan, with 1.04 billion yuan per day in average, equivalent to that for the whole year of 1978. Guiyang's economic growth rate reached 9.9%, ranking first in the provincial capital cities for six consecutive years. In the first half of this year, with the continuously increasing downward pressure on the economy, the city-wide regional GDP reached 178.567 billion yuan, an increase of 9.1%, making Guiyang be among the best of the provincial capital cities for 26 quarters in a row.

From 1964 onwards, the country carried out large-scale construction of the third-tier cities, and a multitude of military and industrial enterprises moved to Guiyang, laying a solid foundation for the development of Guiyang's real economy. After the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, Guiyang saw an increasingly growing real economy, a shift from a weak city to a strong one in this aspect. The structure ratio of three industries was adjusted from 13.4:65.4:21.2 in 1978 to 4:37.2:58.8 in 2018, developing an industrial development landscape of "showing better signs of improvement in stability for the primary industry, transformation and upgrading for the secondary industry, and growing bigger and stronger for the tertiary industry." Especially since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, Guiyang has seized a new round of scientific and technological revolution and industrial transformation opportunities by adhering to innovation-driven and big data-driven strategy, promoting changes in the quality, efficiency and momentum of economic development and accelerating the building of modern economic system, with a main focus on the supply-side structural reform. In 2018, the added value of the new economy and the green economy accounted for 21% and 42% of the regional GDP. The proportion of R&D investment in GDP increased to 1.7%. The number of patents per 10,000 persons reached 12.8. The total number of high-tech enterprises in the city was 750, with the contribution rate of scientific and technological progress at 61% and the comprehensive scientific and technological progress index at 94.7%. The big data industry started from scratch and is increasing its pulling power. In 2018, the total number of big data enterprises reached 1,632 and the revenue of big data enterprises' main business exceeded 100 billion yuan. Big data has proved to be a strong engine for Guiyang to promote its high-quality development. "China's Big Data Valley" has become a great label for the world to know Guiyang.

Before the 1980s, Guiyang was once one of the cities suffering from acid rain pollution most severely in the country. With the development of "circular economy" as the main instrumentality, the CPC Guiyang Municipal Committee and the Guiyang Municipal People's Government have been focusing on the improvement of ecological environment, and in 2001, they successfully removed the label of Guiyang as an "acid rain city." In the new century, Guiyang City paid more attention to ecological environmental protection. In 2012, it was approved to become the country's first model city of ecological civilization; in 2015, it succeeded in passing the acceptance of the national environmental protection model city; in 2018, it was awarded one of the top ten ecological civilization cities in the country, National Forest City and other honorary titles. At the end of 2018, the city's forest coverage rate reached 52%, the air quality rate hit 97.8%, and the water quality of centralized drinking water sources was 100% stable. The "Cool Guiyang" became a signature label for Guiyang.

Since the reform and opening up, especially the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, Guiyang has been upholding the concept of transportation leading development by promoting large-scale construction and building a large network. It has fueled large-scale construction through the building of a large road network, broadened the urban framework, and expanded urban space and size. In 1991, the first expressway in Guiyang was opened to traffic. In 2015, expressways were available from county to county. By the end of 2018, the expressway mileage of the city reached 602 kilometers, accounting for nearly one-tenth of the province. In 1997, Guiyang Longdongbao Airport was completed and opened. In 2018, the airport handled 20.094 million passengers. In 2014, the Guiyang-Guangzhou High-speed Railway was officially opened to traffic, marking that Guiyang entered the "era of high-speed rail". In 2018, rail transit line 1 was operated across the board, leading Guiyang to enter the "era of rail transit." In 2013, the framework highway network with a total of 374.4 kilometers that features "three rings and sixteen branch lines" was built. With the continuous improvement of the comprehensive three-dimensional transportation system, the standing of Guiyang as the transportation hub in western China has become increasingly prominent. Driven by the transportation, Guiyang has been speeding up its urban construction. In 2018, Guiyang's urbanization rate reached 75.4%, or 1.6 times that of the province (47.52%) and 1.3 times that of the country (59.58%). The built-up area of Guiyang reached 433 square kilometers, representing 7.2 times that in 1978, and the resident population was 4,881,900, which was 2.1 times that in 1978 (2,341,700). Today's Guiyang has become a beautiful homeland for people to live, engage in all kinds of economic activities and travel.