Dear guests, colleagues, and friends,

It gives me great pleasure to attend this forum. Common prosperity is an essential requirement of socialism, a key feature of Chinese-style modernization, and a shared aspiration of the people. Finance is the core of the modern economy and plays an important role in economic and social development. Common prosperity must be taken as an important focus of our financial work. Today, I would like to share with you some of my views on the theme of this forum.

I. The basic conception and defining features of common prosperity

Adhering to the people-centered development philosophy, President Xi Jinping has made a series of important instructions on realizing common prosperity for all people and elaborated on the issue of common prosperity at the tenth meeting of the Central Committee for Financial and Economic Affairs. At the recent Central Economic Work Conference, he reiterated a proper understanding of the strategic goals of and the practical approaches to common prosperity. These important and insightful statements have far-reaching impacts.

In my understanding, the key to common prosperity is high-quality development. The two reinforce each other. Therefore, in pursuit of common prosperity, we need to advance high-quality development.

The primary task in achieving common prosperity is to continuously liberate and develop productive forces, create and accumulate social wealth, and make the pie bigger and better with high-quality development.

Common prosperity means affluence shared by everyone rather than a few people. The common prosperity we desire is not egalitarianism. Rather, we aim to promote a fairer distribution based on efficiency, optimize the mechanism of primary distribution and redistribution, establish a reasonable system of the tertiary distribution that suits the social governance, and then we can divide the pie properly through reasonable institutional arrangements.

Common prosperity is not only about material affluence, but also the spiritual and cultural affluence and the all-round development of human beings. It can be achieved through the coordinated development of economy, politics, culture, society, and ecology, and through the continuous improvement of basic public services.

Common prosperity is ultimately for all the people. We should always adhere to the people-centered development philosophy and uphold the principle that development is for the people and by the people, and that its fruits should be shared by the people, thus pursuing common prosperity for all.

The pathway to common prosperity is long and arduous. A happy life comes from hard work and common prosperity depends on diligence and wisdom. It is an arduous, complicated, and long-term task, so we will do everything within our capacity with perseverance to achieve it step by step.

Common prosperity has distinctive Chinese features of our times. Our people will work hard and help each other to achieve the common goals of living a prosperous life confidently and with self-reliance, creating a livable and business-friendly environment with social harmony and easy access to public services. So, all-round development will be achieved for the people and the community, and people will share the fruits of reform, development and overall social progress.

II.   Focuses of financial inclusion for common prosperity

In recent years, the financial sector together with many other sectors are implementing the decisions of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council on developing financial inclusion, and an inclusive financial service and security system compatible with a well-off society in an all-round way has taken shape. People of the financial inclusion circle need to take the initiative to promote common prosperity.

To meet the requirements of the strategic goals of and practical approaches to common prosperity, we still face many challenges in achieving the high-quality development of financial inclusion, and thus need to make continuous improvements.

First, how can financial inclusion better consolidate poverty alleviation achievements and effectively prevent people from falling back into poverty? In some areas, poverty alleviation results as well as the foundation of industries and sustainable development are yet to be consolidated, the income of people lifted out of poverty needs to be more stable, financial services need to be more effective, targeted, and precise, and the financial sector needs to play a bigger role in facilitating industrial development and fostering more entrepreneurs.

Second, how can financial inclusion promote common prosperity through better integration with the rural revitalization strategy? In 2020, the national per capita disposable income of urban residents was RMB43,834, while that of rural residents was RMB17,131, indicating a significant income gap. The key to a successful rural revitalization strategy lies in achieving the goals of“thriving businesses, an eco-friendly environment, social etiquette and civility, effective governance and prosperity”, which puts forward higher requirements for the depth and breadth of financial services.

Third, how can financial inclusion help more low-income people join the ranks of the middle-income group? According to the National Bureau of Statistics, in 2019, the low- and lower middle-income groups in China (with an average monthly income of nearly RMB1,000), accounted for 40 percent of the total households and amounted to a population of 610 million. How to help the low-income group (including those in both urban and rural areas) join the ranks of the middle-income group is the key to achieving common prosperity and forming an olive-shaped social structure. The financial sector should focus on better consolidating the achievements of mass entrepreneurship and innovation, continuously supporting micro and small Enterprise (MSE), and implementing employment-oriented policies in achieving high-quality development, so as to promote the steady increase of people’s income.

Fourth, how to ensure that the general public can better benefit from the value and convenience of financial services? At present, although basic financial services are available in urban and rural areas across the country, the functions of finance need to be further explored. For example, some elderly people are still on the wrong side of the“digital divide”,finding it difficult to enjoy the convenience of digital finance; some people still lack the awareness of investment and wealth management, and the function of finance in empowering people to preserve and increase wealth needs to be further explored too; people's resilience to shocks of serious diseases and other risks is not strong enough as insurance is yet to build a strong safety net for the people.

Fifth, how to make financial inclusion-related policies work more closely with fiscal, industrial, and employment policies so as to effectively form basic systems to support primary distribution, redistribution, and tertiary distribution.

III. Facilitating common prosperity with high-quality development of financial inclusion

As China embarks on a new journey to build a great modern socialist country in all respects, common prosperity has been given new meanings. It is the requirement of the times for the financial system to facilitate common prosperity with high-quality development of financial inclusion. Here are some priorities to address:

(1) Narrowing the income gap and pooling financial wisdom to improve financial services for MSE. MSE are major job creators and the main channel to steadily increase the income of urban and rural residents. We should give better play to the role of“synergy of multiple policies” in encouraging inclusive financial services to support MSE. We should build a long-term mechanism of “lending with confidence, willingness, ability and professionalism”and support innovation, entrepreneurship, and sustainable development of micro and small market entities such as MSE and the self-employed. With these efforts, distribution can be fairer and more effective and the income gap can be narrowed. We also need to give full play to the decisive role of the market in allocating resources, and broaden the financing channels for MSE through the financial market. We must give better play to the role of the government, always adhere to the principle of“unswervingly consolidating and developing the public sector, and unswervingly encouraging, supporting and guiding the development of the non-public sector,”support the development of the private economy, strengthen the resilience of the supply chain, and create a sound environment for the orderly and effective development of MSE.

 (2) Narrowing the urban-rural gap and contributing to the rural revitalization strategy. Rural revitalization is a major strategy for narrowing the urban-rural gap and building a great modern socialist country. We should give full play to the role of financial inclusion in consolidating and expanding the achievements of poverty alleviation and integrating them with rural revitalization, continuously optimize the system of rural financial services, and promote more balanced urban and rural financial services. We must concentrate on securing“thriving businesses”, continue to innovate financial products and services, put rural assets to use, and increase farmers' property income, thus consolidating the economic foundation for rural revitalization. We must faithfully implement Xi Jinping's Thought on Ecological Civilization and realize the integrated development of inclusive finance and green finance, to make inclusive finance greener, and green finance more inclusive.

 (3) Narrowing the regional gap and continuously exploring financial solutions to promote common prosperity through the pilot zones for inclusive financial reform. We should give play to the positive role of financial inclusion in effectively advancing key regional strategies and coordinated regional development strategies and press ahead with the building of pilot zones for inclusive financial reform in accordance with local conditions and through targeted policies, and bring about greater progress in wider areas. In particular, it is necessary to explore reform and development paths for financial inclusion in underdeveloped regions. We should not only highlight the leading role of developed areas like Zhejiang Province, but also factor in the actual conditions and needs of underdeveloped areas to fully motivate them to systemically draw upon the best practices of pilot zones. In this process, we must underline the role of locally incorporated banks, which should adhere to the principle of “serving locals, serving MSE, and serving agriculture, rural areas, and rural residents,” and cultivate the local market to promote a more even distribution of financial resources across the region.

 (4) Improving people's livelihood and welfare and expanding the channels for offering financial services to key areas and key groups. The people's livelihood is an integral part of common prosperity as well as a key target of financial inclusion. We should accelerate improving financial services for the elderly, the disabled, migrant workers, and college students; effectively support key welfare programs such as pensions, education, medical care, and employment; promote entrepreneurship to increase income; guide a reasonable consumption smoothing; and explore providing financial support for tertiary distribution through services such as payment, settlement and charitable trust. We must also establish the concept of responsible finance, provide financial consumers with products and services that match their risk tolerance, adjust the threshold for financial products with lower risks, and enhance the inclusiveness of financial services, so as to create conditions for effectively increasing residents’ property income.

 (5) Promoting cultural prosperity and continuously enriching its content by cultivating a good financial culture and improving the financial literacy of the whole population. The financial culture emphasizes honesty and trustworthiness, the spirit of contract, rational investment, and a risk-based approach. It not only promotes material wealth, but also constitutes an organic part of cultural prosperity. We must cultivate a positive and upright financial culture and strengthen the spirit of contract and integrity of each citizen. We should enhance the financial health awareness of residents and households. Based on the existing wide coverage of financial inclusion, we should advance financial health to optimize the financial status of residents and households and stimulate their motivation and potential for innovation and entrepreneurship, thus laying a more solid foundation among the public for common prosperity. We should strengthen the top-down design of financial education, systematically integrate financial knowledge into the national education system, and coordinate and provide integrated financial literacy activities to help the people “keep money safe”.

Dear colleagues and friends, as the Chinese poem goes, “A time will come to ride the wind and break the waves; I'll set my cloud-white sail and cross the sea which raves.”In the new era and in our new journey, the financial sector bears the responsibility to take well-coordinated steps toward making our people prosperous, our nation strong, and our country beautiful through high-quality financial inclusion, thus effectively promoting the common prosperity of all Chinese people. Zhejiang Province is taking the lead in building a demonstration zone for common prosperity, and the financial sector will continue to focus on financial inclusion to render full assistance. We look forward to working with the local government to explore a successful path to common prosperity and contribute to developing China into a great modern socialist country.

To conclude, I wish this forum great success!

Thank you.