Освоение западных районов КНР

Abstract

The social and economic transformation in China, underway since the early 1980s, is characterised by well-designed and scientifically grounded reform. The concept of three-stage economic transformation envisions in it third stage (the first half of the XXXI century) reaching the average per capita GDP at the level of medium developed countries, completion of most of the modernisation of the country and turning it into a wealthy, democratic and civilized socialist state. This stage gives priority to a large-scale developing of western regions. The programme of their forced development was summed up, as is usually the case with the Chinese, in a coined slogan: "Go west". The western regions (west China) include 10 administrative units (56 % of the territory and 23 % of the population of the country), which contain 80 % of the idle land resources of China. The existing gap in the development between the east and the west of the country is fraught with forced domestic migration, tensions between the provinces; it encourages economic separatism, impedes the reforms and further modernisation of the country. The economic situation in China permits to forecast favourable conditions for intensive development of western regions' infrastructure: transport communications, electrical grids, hydrotechnical structures; and also for strengthening environment protection and attracting foreign investment. 2010 will already see an optimal situation for economic rise, the ability for selfdevelopment and innovations, stabilisation in the divergence of the living standards in the eastern and western provinces, elimination of the worst poverty, a certain recovery of economic balance and a growing urbanisation rate. A special emphasis is made on the expansion of the sphere of foreign investment and preferential access of foreign capital. At the same time, international cooperation in developing western China is adversely affected by the approach of the Republic's government to migration policy. The decision adopted in 2000, according to which 60 thousand Chinese farmers are to be resettled in Tibet, raised serious objections in the Western countries. Nevertheless, there are justified expectations that bridging the gap in the development of the regions will permit to stabilise the situation among the indigenous population and will prevent forced migration from the Western provinces. Once progress is achieved, the region will become an important outpost for promoting the interests of China in the cooperation with the countries of Central Asia.