Narrowing gap
Chen, from the Bank of China research institute, highlighted the significance of carrying forward the region's growth in narrowing the gap among different areas, building a national unified market and fostering a new development paradigm, saying that the region is competitive in terms of both population and its strength in science and technology.
The region's population, which accounts for 26.6 percent of the national total, means it will be an important part of the overall domestic market. "Thus the quicker rise of the central region will facilitate the development of a strong domestic market," he said.
He added that the rise of the central region will be evident from aspects such as the upgrading of industries, green development and high-level opening-up.
The quicker rise of the central region will help build a new growth engine, promote coordinated regional development and offer strong impetus to high-quality economic growth and the "dual circulation "development paradigm, in which the domestic market is the mainstay and the domestic and foreign markets reinforce each other, he added.
Other analysts have hailed the significance of decisions adopted at the meeting on March 30, which included steps to accelerate the development of modern infrastructure and logistics systems in the central region and to follow a new path of green and low-carbon development and step up the concentrated use of energy resources.
Tommy Wu, lead economist at Oxford Economics, a think tank in the United Kingdom, said the development of modern infrastructure and logistic systems in the central region would boost productivity in the region and could help attract and facilitate the expansion of various industrial and service sectors.
"As production costs increase in the coastal regions, more enterprises will be willing to move part of their operations inland to take advantage of lower production costs," he said.
"But these regions need to equip themselves first, with the right infrastructure to capitalize on this future trend. Modernizing infrastructure and logistic systems is the right formula."
"For China to advance from a middle-income country toward a high-income country, no regions should be left behind," he added.
The growing attractiveness of the central region to businesses has also directly benefited some logistics service providers.
Tang Na, general manager of Sinotrans Logistics Central China Ltd, a courier service provider based in Hefei, Anhui province, said the region's increasingly robust manufacturing sector has been bringing more opportunities for logistics companies.
The company's business has been expanding consistently, with more high-end products including cars and intelligent home appliances reaching overseas markets with the company's service, he said.
Wang Han, chief economist at the brokerage Industrial Securities, said the potential for the upgrading of industry chains, the development of green industries and the use of the latest technologies is immense in the central region compared with eastern areas, due to its relatively low level of industrialization.
However, a pressing challenge for policymakers is to overturn the trend of increasing outflow of talent from the region to coastal areas, as the competition for talent will be the key to development of a cutting-edge manufacturing sector, he said.
