Policy gurus gather to seek world solutions

Chinese advisers play leading part in push for new relationships

About 500 think tank experts, politicians and representatives of international organizations from 25 countries worldwide are in Beijing for the Think 20 (T20) Summit that runs from July 29 to 30 to contribute their wisdom to the G20 Hangzhou Summit on building new global relationships.

As one of the important outreach groups of the G20, the T20 is a significant platform for global think tank researchers to provide policymaking thoughts and suggestions for the G20, said Chinese G20 Sherpa and Vice Foreign Minister Li Baodong.

As this year's G20 and T20 president, China is looking to contribute solutions to the problems facing global governance. Li said in his opening speech that as the president of the G20 this year and a responsible developing country, China will achieve the expected goals of the G20 Hangzhou Summit together with other G20 member countries.

Li said he expects the G20 Hangzhou summit to achieve several major goals including innovating growth models, improving global economic governance, revitalizing international trade and investment as well as focusing on development issues.

Zhao Baige, a member of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress and chair of the expert panel of the RDI think tank program at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences said at the summit that the community of common destiny advanced by President Xi Jinping should be the basic principle behind the establishment of a new global relationship, and all-round innovation should provide the necessary fuel to achieve development goals.

She also pointed out that the Belt and Road Initiative advanced by China will drive new and successful global and regional relationships.

Cai Fang, vice-president of CASS, used his keynote speech to outline three major global governance issues facing the international community.

The current potential for economic growth is limited, which indicates structural reform is urgently required, Cai said.

"Meanwhile, the international community's capacity to cope with financial turbulence should also be improved."

He cited multiple challenges including climate change, imbalanced global development, the need for poverty alleviation and sustainable development in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

To help provide policymaking insights to the G20 on these global issues, the three Chinese think tanks organizing the T20 issued questionnaires to think tank experts worldwide.

Based on their consensus, the T20 has formulated a policy recommendation to the G20, involving several aspects of global importance, including the global economic governance mechanism, innovation and structural reform as well as international finance, trade and investment.

T20 Summit participants affirmed that the T20 is an invaluable source of information and support for G20.

Bozkurt Aran, director of the TEPAV Center for Multilateral Trade Studies in Turkey, described the T20 as "a bank of ideas in the discussion of global governance".

This year's T20 Summit is organized by three major Chinese think tanks - the Institute of World Economics and Politics at CASS, the Shanghai Institutes for International Studies and the Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies at Renmin University of China.

wangyiqing@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 07/30/2016 page12)