Opening-up helps drive global prosperity

SEOUL－China's reform and opening-up policy has created prosperity for the people, while helping foreign companies to find business opportunities in the country and contributing to global growth, a South Korean entrepreneur said.

"The prosperity of the Chinese people is the biggest change among others from China's reform and opening-up policy, which has continued for the past four decades," said Park Keun-tae, president and chief executive of CJ Group China and CJ Logistics, a logistics arm of South Korea's food and logistics conglomerate CJ Group, in a recent interview with Xinhua News Agency.

Park said the current cityscape of Beijing, with its forest of buildings, neatly built roads and well-dressed passers-by, was unimaginable before the adoption of the reform and opening-up policy.

"The results came from reform and opening-up, which has inspired vigor across the whole of society and boosted workers' productivity," said Park.

"Reform and opening-up has encouraged every member of Chinese society to work harder for success, leading the entire nation on a path toward development. Reform and opening-up efforts over the past 40 years have made China what it is now," said Park.

South Korean conglomerate CJ Group set up an office in Hong Kong in 1978 to "learn China's market", and Park began his Chinese career in Hong Kong in 1984 when he was 30 years old.

CJ Group established business operations on the Chinese mainland in 1994. It currently has 141 subsidiaries in 66 cities across the country, operating 31 factories and employing around 23,000 workers. CJ Group spans businesses from food and logistics to biotechnology, entertainment and home shopping.

"Because of the reform and opening-up policy, CJ Group was able to enter China and make a success of it," said Park, who heads CJ Group's China headquarters. Park learned Mandarin Chinese early on in his career to build friendship with his Chinese partners while conducting business.

"China's reform and opening-up has contributed significantly to global development," Park said, as the Chinese government created huge demand via expansionary fiscal policy during the global financial crisis and thereafter, serving as a driving force for global economic growth via the largest consumer market in the world.

China, Park said, has recently become the world's "innovation lab", as the country is leading the development of innovative industries, such as artificial intelligence, cloud computing and internet of things.

In accordance with China's sustained development and growth, CJ Group has been preparing to expand its business in China for the past 10 years. CJ Logistics has recently increased its research and development in drone delivery, automated package sorting and robot use within warehouses.

Echoing South Korea's New Northern Policy and the China-proposed Belt and Road Initiative, CJ Logistics is promoting its Northern Logistics Plan, for which the South Korean company has recently opened a massive logistics center in Shenyang, Liaoning province in Northeast China.

If railways are connected along the eastern and western corridors of the peninsula, it will create a "new logistics silk road" by linking it to the Trans-China Railway, the Trans-Mongolian Railway and the Trans-Siberian Railway, Park said.

It would enable CJ Logistics to provide door-to-door delivery services between Asia and Europe, reducing costs and raising effectiveness in logistics, according to Park.