Upholding the banner of development, writing a new chapter together

• Marking the 5th anniversary of global development initiative

THE GDI provided China’s insight and contribution to reinvigorating global development. In just five years, it has turned from a Chinese proposal into a global consensus, and from a statement of goals into concrete actions, winning wide appreciation and drawing active participation from the international community.

On September 25 this year, China President Xi Jinping sent a congratulatory letter to the High-Level Dialogue Marking 5th Anniversary of the Global Development Initiative, stressing that with the joint efforts of all parties, the GDI has been widely implemented, with cooperation projects under the initiative taking root and yielding outcomes in more than 120 countries, writing a new chapter of common development and win-win cooperation. Over the past five years, the consensus on the GDI has forged global synergy.

As the Chinese saying goes, “Alone, one falters under the weight; together, we stride on the road.”

The fundamental reason why the Initiative has far-reaching international influence over the past five years lies in its conformance with the evolving trend of global development and its representation of the shared aspirations of developing countries.

President Xi Jinping presided over a High-Level Dialogue on Global Development. China has held high-level meetings on the GDI during 5th consecutive UNGA sessions, and launched the Forum on Global Action for Shared Development. These follow-up actions have enabled more policy dialogues and exchange of ideas.

To date, more than 130 countries and international organizations have expressed support for the GDI and participated in its cooperation, and nearly 100 countries and international and regional organizations have signed the GDI cooperation documents with China; the Group of Friends of the GDI has expanded to nearly 90 countries; more than 30 GDI cooperation mechanisms and platforms, such as the Global Development Promotion Center Network and the Global Knowledge Network for Development, have been established, providing solid support for global sustainable development.

Over the past five years, the GDI cooperation has delivered an impressive scorecard. Since the GDI was proposed, it dedicates to resolving development challenges, uniting collective strength, and takes the commitment to bettering the people’s livelihood as the starting point and the ultimate goal of deeper South-South cooperation.

Through the China-UN Peace and Development Fund, the Global Development and South-South Cooperation Fund, and other funding initiatives, more than 23 billion US dollars have been mobilised, supporting the implementation of over 2000 GDI projects across diverse areas such as poverty reduction, food security, industrialisation, digital economy and climate change.

Furthermore, China has trained more than 200,000 people in different professions, and brought tangible benefits to ordinary people in more than 120 countries, serving as an “accelerator” and “booster” for the implementation of the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

Over the past five years, the four global initiatives have complemented and reinforced each other, jointly advancing the building of a community with a shared future for humanity.

Following the GDI, President Xi Jinping successively put forward the Global Security Initiative (GSI), the Global Civilization Initiative (GCI) and the Global Governance Initiative (GGI).

The four global initiatives are complementary and indivisible, focus on addressing structural deficits such as the North-South imbalance, security disorder, civilizational estrangement, and governance failure.

They advocate generating cooperative interests through development, safeguarding cooperative environment through security, building cooperative consensus through civilization, and refining cooperative mechanisms through governance.

The four global initiatives have profoundly shaped the trajectory of developing nations in recent years, reinforced economic resilience, regional stability, cultural vitality and institutional fairness amid the trend toward a multipolar world, and ultimately served the goal of building a community with a shared future for humanity.

China and Tanzania have forged ahead hand in hand and promoted the GDI to yield fruitful results. Since the GDI’s inception, both sides committed to translating its vision into action.

Grounded in development and people’s well-being, our two countries have given vivid expression to the contemporary relevance of the principle of sincerity, real results, amity and good faith, as well as win-win development cooperation.

Recently, when attending the reception hosted by the Chinese Embassy in Tanzania marking the 77th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China, Tanzanian Minister for Foreign Affairs and East African Cooperation, Ambassador Mahmoud Thabit Kombo, commended that the four global initiatives put forward by President Xi Jinping offer proposals for addressing shared challenges with the view of crafting common solutions to our benefits.

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Tanzania welcomes dialogue on all these proposals and congratulates China on the commemoration to mark the 5th anniversary of the GDI at the sidelines of the 81st Session of the UN General Assembly.

From the Agricultural Technology Demonstration Center in Morogoro doubling grain yields to the zero-tariff policy for African exports unlocking trade potential; from the East Africa Commercial and Logistics Center rising as a modern logistics and trading hub to the TAZARA revitalisation project reviving an economic lifeline, ChinaTanzania cooperation under the GDI has yielded bountiful harvests across diverse sectors.

The initiative has substantially bolstered Tanzania’s capacity for independent and sustainable growth, delivered a tangible sense of gain and happiness to the Tanzanian people, accelerated national modernization, and injected robust momentum into elevating the China-Tanzania comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership to new heights.

We are living through a period of transformation and turbulence. The North-South gap keeps widening, and the global development cause faces grave challenges.

All of this confirms the pressing relevance of the GDI. First, we should enhance solidarity and cooperation to foster a peaceful environment for development.

We should uphold the international system centered around the UN and the international order based on international law, and make every effort to foster a generally stable international environment and favorable conditions for global development cooperation.

China will, as always, support Tanzania in safeguarding its national sovereignty, development rights and interests, as well as in pursuing a development path suited to its national conditions. Second, we should combine our efforts to enhance our complementarity.

We should put development firmly at the center of the international agenda, and make more resources available for global development.

China will promote the deep alignment of the GDI with the Tanzania Development Vision 2050 and the 10 partnership actions under the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation.

By leveraging platforms such as the Mwalimu Julius Nyerere Leadership School, both sides will conduct regular exchanges of experience in state governance to provide top-level design and institutional safeguards for practical cooperation.

Third, we should expand innovation-driven growth to unlock new momentum for development.

We should champion openness and cooperation, and embrace the trends of green, low-carbon and digital transformation, in a strong push to eliminate the digital and AI divides between North and South.

China stands ready to enrich the GDI in emerging frontiers such as AI, digital economy and new energy, and cultivate new drivers of growth for China-Tanzania cooperation. We are not alone on the Great Way and the whole world is one family.

Standing at the new historical starting point of the GDI’s 5th anniversary, China is ready to work with Tanzania, under the guidance of the four global initiatives, to uphold international justice, deepen South-South cooperation, and jointly act as builders of world peace, contributors to global development and defenders of international order, making new and greater contributions to the building of a community with a shared future for humanity.