Explainer: Why China's 15th five-year plan period is critical for its modernization drive

BEIJING, Nov. 9 (Xinhua) -- Formulating and implementing five-year plans has been a hallmark of the Communist Party of China (CPC)'s governance.

At a key Party plenum in October, the CPC leadership adopted its recommendations for formulating the 15th Five-Year Plan (2026-2030), outlining China's economic and social development priorities for the next five years.

According to the recommendations, the 15th Five-Year Plan period is a critical stage for building on past achievements and breaking new ground toward the basic realization of socialist modernization.

Since the early stage of reform and opening up, when the Party set the goal of basically achieving socialist modernization by the middle of this century, every five-year plan has been designed and implemented in line with this overarching vision.

Taking into account both China's development progress and its present-day conditions, the Party advanced the target year to 2035, tightening the timeline and raising the bar for implementation.

With only a decade remaining before 2035, the 15th Five-Year Plan period will be pivotal for consolidating the foundations and making comprehensive efforts toward this goal.

To ensure sound economic and social development during this period, China will tackle deep-seated problems that hinder high-quality growth and modernization.

At this crucial juncture, the country must overcome existing barriers and lay a solid groundwork for the basic realization of socialist modernization, while advancing across the economic, political, cultural, social, and ecological spheres.

China is poised to complete a number of strategic and landmark tasks during this period, including achieving breakthroughs in core technologies in key fields, improving mechanisms for high-standard opening up, and peaking carbon emissions.

Meanwhile, for the broader goals set for 2035 -- such as raising per capita GDP to the level of a mid-level developed country and achieving greater self-reliance and strength in science and technology -- China will focus resources and intensify efforts to secure major breakthroughs and decisive progress during the 15th Five-Year Plan period. ■