The Strategy of Sustainable Development

It refers to development that meets current needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs. The core idea is to coordinate economic development, and resources and eco-environment protection, so that future generations can enjoy sufficient resources and a good resource environment. The goal it pursues is not only to satisfy the various legitimate needs of human beings, to fully develop individuals under certain historical conditions, but also to protect resources and the eco- environment without threatening the survival and development of future generations. It pays special attention to the ecological rationality of various economic activities, and emphasizes that economic activities that are beneficial to resources and the environment should be encouraged, otherwise they should be abandoned. The sustainable development strategy refers to the action plan and program for achieving sustainable development. It is the general term for the country to achieve sustainable development in various fields. It requires coordinating development goals of all aspects, especially social and economic development goals and eco-environmental development goals. In June 1992, the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development was held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The Conference proposed and adopted a global sustainable development strategy—“Agenda for the 21st Century”, and required countries to formulate their own sustainable development strategies, plans and countermeasures. On July 4, 1994, the State Council approved China's first national-level sustainable development strategy—“White Paper on China's Population, Environment and Development in the 21st Century”.

The “Recommendations of the CPC Central Committee on Formulating the ‘Ninth Five-Year Plan’ for National Economic and Social Development and the Visionary Goals for 2010” reviewed and approved by the 5th Plenary Session of the 14th CPC Central Committee in September 1995, proposed that the realization of sustainable development should be a major strategy in the process of modernization. The Report of the 15th CPC National Congress in 1997 reiterated that the sustainable development strategy must be implemented in modernization, and the sustainable development strategy was identified as a basic national policy. In March 2001, the Fourth Session of the Ninth National People's Congress adopted the “Outline of the ‘Tenth Five-Year Plan’”, completing the historical process from establishment, preliminary implementation to comprehensive promotion of the sustainable development strategy. The Report of the 16th CPC National Congress in 2002 not only included "implementing the sustainable development strategy and achieving the coordination of economic development and population, resources, and environment" into the basic experience that must be adhered to in building socialism with Chinese characteristics, but also established sustainable development as the goal of building a well-off society in an all-round way. In 2003, the Third Plenary Session of the 16th CPC Central Committee put forward “adhering to people-oriented and establishing a comprehensive, coordinated and sustainable development concept”, which further deepened the concept of sustainable development as an important content of the scientific development concept.

China is a country with a large population and relatively insufficient resources. The implementation of the sustainable development strategy is of particular importance and urgency. It is necessary to give high priority to population control, resource conservation and environmental protection, adapt population growth to the development of social productive forces, coordinate economic construction with resources and the environment, and achieve a virtuous circle. The guiding ideology of China ’s implementation of the sustainable development strategy is: adhere to people-oriented, take the harmony between man and nature as the main line, take economic development as the core, take the improvement of the quality of life of the people as the fundamental starting point, take science and technology and system innovation as the breakthrough, comprehensively promote the coordination of economic society and population, resources and eco-environment, continuously improve China's overall national strength and competitiveness, and lay a solid foundation for building a well-off society in an all-round way. The main principles followed in implementing the sustainable development strategy are: the principle of fairness, which refers to inter-generational fairness, horizontal fairness between peers, and the fairness between man and nature, and other living beings; the principle of sustainability, which refers to the ability of the ecosystem to maintain its productivity when it is disturbed, requiring people to adjust their lifestyles according to the conditions of sustainability and determine their own consumption standards within the range of ecological possibilities; the principle of harmony, which refers to the harmonious development, mutual benefit and symbiosis between humans, and between humans and nature.

The general idea of implementing sustainable development is to: take the transformation of the economic development mode and the strategic economic restructuring as a major decision to promote sustainable economic development; take the establishment of a resource-saving and environment-friendly society as an important part of promoting sustainable development; take safeguarding and improving people's livelihood as the core requirements of sustainable development; take scientific and technological innovation as an inexhaustible driving force to promote sustainable development; take deepening system reform, and expanding opening up and cooperation as the basic guarantee for promoting sustainable development. The sustainable development strategy embodies a scientific summary of the laws of social development in China. It is a major choice made by the Communist Party of China in the historical process of leading the people to promote Reform and Opening-up and socialist modernization in the new period of Reform and Opening-up, as well as an important part of Party governance, which embodies the CPC’s new concepts and new ideas on development issues. The sustainable development strategy has become an important guiding strategy to guide the development of the national economy and society, and has influenced the development of society and the improvement of people's living standards in deeper levels and broader fields.