Ladies and Gentlemen,
Friends,
As an old Chinese saying goes, a commitment, once made, should be delivered. Boosting development in the Asia-Pacific requires real actions by all of us members. As the world's second largest economy, China knows fully well its responsibility. Over the past five years, we have taken proactive steps to adapt to, manage and steer the new normal of China's economy and deepened supply-side structural reform. As a result, China's economy has maintained steady performance, and we are pursuing better-quality, more efficient, fairer and more sustainable development. Over the past four years, China's economy has grown by 7.2% on the average annually, contributing over 30% of global growth. China is now a main driver powering global growth.
We have worked hard to remove systematical institutional barriers that impede development through comprehensive reform. As many as 360 major reform initiatives and more than 1,500 reform measures have been taken. Breakthroughs have been made in key areas, and general frameworks for reform have been put in place in major sectors. We have sped up efforts to build new institutions of the open economy and transform models of foreign trade and outbound investment to continue the shift from quantitative to qualitative improvement in trade.
We have advanced theoretical, practical, institutional, cultural and other explorations to unleash new impetus for growth. China has become a huge platform where all factors and players of innovation converge to make a real difference. From infrastructure to various economic sectors, from business models to ways of consumption, innovation is leading the way.
We have pursued a people-centered philosophy of development to make our development more inclusive and beneficial to all. Individual income has registered sustained growth, outpacing GDP growth for many years. Income gaps between urban and rural areas and between different regions have been narrowing, middle-income group expanding, and Gini coefficient dropping. More than 13 million new urban jobs have been created every year for four consecutive years. Significant advances have been made in pursuing green development, resulting in considerable reduction in the intensity of energy and resource consumption and marked improvement in the ecological environment.
To lift all the remaining poor people out of poverty is a solemn commitment made by the Chinese government to the people. It is uppermost in my mind, and I have spent more energy on poverty alleviation than anything else. Over the past five years, I have been to many poor areas in China to pin down the causes of poverty and address them in a targeted way. As a result, decisive progress has been made in the fight against poverty. Over the past five years, we have lifted more than 60 million people out of poverty. The poverty headcount ratio has declined, and per capita rural income in poor areas has maintained double-digit growth. This has not come easily, and we are proud of what we have achieved in poverty alleviation.
