Li Keqiang: 'Made in China' is carrying out a 'quality revolution'

At an executive meeting of the State Council on August 24, there was only one topic at the core: plans to improve the standards and quality of consumer goods, and increase the effective supply of "Made in China" products to meet the demand of consumption upgrading. It shows the weight of this matter.

Promoting "Made in China" to complete a "quality revolution" is closely related to building an upgraded version of the Chinese economy and moving the Chinese economy toward the medium-high end. Premier Li Keqiang has been keeping a keen interest in this process. The decision follows the implementation of the "Equipment Manufacturing Standardization and Quality Improvement Plan" at the State Council's executive meeting on April 6, leading the "Made in China" upgrade. The key areas identified are robotics, advanced rail transit equipment, agricultural machinery, high-performance medical instruments and so on. The logic can be understood as "homeopathy", that is, from the equipment, to solve the problem of "what to build with".

The logic of this meeting can be understood as "push-back", that is, from the end of the consumer goods, to solve the "why" problem. Why? Consumer goods, of course, are fundamentally created to meet consumer needs. At today's stage of China's development, a considerable number of middle-income groups have emerged, whose consumer demand has been upgraded from the simple stage of food and clothing in the past to the current stage of pursuing quality. To produce a large number of products that consumers are willing to buy and accept, it is inevitable that the whole manufacturing industry should follow up. This is called "forcing" -- forcing the manufacturing industry to transform and upgrade by improving the standards and quality of consumer goods.

"Follow the trend" and "force" both mean that "Made in China" needs to complete a "quality revolution". "MadeinChina" or "MadeinChina" can no longer be just a synonym for low-end and cheap. "Made in China" has never rejected or given up "Laoshou".

In terms of historical context, in the early years of reform and opening up in the 1980s, a large number of foreign consumer goods, from watches to home appliances to cars, entered the Chinese market. It is in this "open eyes to see the world", after hard experience, domestic goods gradually realized import substitution, occupied most of the domestic market, and began to sell the world. However, as mentioned above, China is now entering a new stage of development, more and more consumers have higher demand, but many domestic products are not kept up with the quality. At the same time, in terms of product innovation, domestic products are also much less impressive. Therefore, it is not surprising that a large number of consumer goods are imported, even as residents spend up to 1.5 trillion yuan abroad every year.

Obviously, the failure to comprehensively improve the standard and quality of consumer goods will, on the one hand, reduce consumer trust and directly affect the domestic consumer market. On the other hand, it will weaken the international competitiveness of Chinese products and affect the export trade. The prime minister even used the term "urgent" to describe the situation.

To this end, the premier to promote "made in China" to complete a "quality revolution", as a main line, almost throughout all aspects of economic work. The Wednesday presided only arrange such an issue that closely around the consumption demand, food, daily life is closely linked with the masses, household appliances, consumer electronics, decoration, clothing, cosmetics and daily-use chemicals, women's and children's elderly and the disabled supplies, stationery and sports leisure products such as general consumer products, achieve quality improvement. Combined with the regular meeting on April 6, we have not only advanced equipment manufacturing, but also consumer goods close to people's livelihood. Thus, the "Made in China" puzzle has been more complete. As the premier pointed out earlier, "Made in China 2025" must not only focus on equipment, but must be an upgrade of the whole industrial chain.

After that, what does the "Made in China" "Quality Revolution" really depend on? There is no doubt that this is the spirit of entrepreneurship and craftsmanship that Premier Li Keqiang has repeatedly emphasized. With the former, there is a system of continuous innovation; With the latter, there is product excellence.