Beijing expects to lead the country for at least two decades to rank among the world's best-developed regions, Beijing Municipal Statistics Bureau spokeswoman Yu Xiuqin said Monday.
"Beijing will boast a per capita gross domestic product (GDP) of over US$10,000 by 2020, when China fulfills its goal of a per capita GDP of US$3,000 as planned," Yu said while discussing the economic development schedule of the Chinese capital.
The two figures are internationally accepted thresholds equating to a "comparatively rich society" and a "rich society" respectively.
Beijing already reached a per capita GDP of US$3,000 last year, according to Yu.
In view of the present vigorous economic growth of the city, especially with confidence being boosted by the ongoing 16th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, Yu is optimistic about achieving the ambitious goal.
The Party congress has pledged efforts to maintain the country's economic growth and to provide China's citizens with a prosperous life.
Yu's confidence comes from the results of five years' hard work when Beijing has almost finished upgrading its economic structure, highlighting service and high-tech industries as important for its future.
"By the end of October, about 60 per cent of the city's industrial output for the year was contributed by services industries, while over 40 per cent of the added industrial value was from high-tech ones," Yu said.
This has led to a better life for local people, characterized by more disposable income, spacious housing, faster and convenient transportation and an improved environment.
The living condition of Beijingers was a bone of contention in the early 1990s. Each resident had a living space of 17.6 square meters at the end of last year, up 45 per cent on 1992.
"If we say one local person, on average, had but a place for a bed at the beginning of 1990s, they now enjoy relatively spacious living," Yu said.
And the situation will improve further as commercial housing will continue to attract the largest proportion of real estate investment in the city, as buying a private residence has been widely accepted by locals.
"Since over 70 per cent of the completed commercial housing in the city has been sold out, we have reason to predict a benign development of the local real estate industry," Yu said.
(China Daily November 12, 2002)
