To ensure the presence of a comprehensive well-off society by 2020 is the common dream of the Ningxia people, and we are now all make unremitting efforts to realize the dream, said Zhang Bawu, an NPC deputy and the director of Ningxia Hui Autonomous Regional Commission of Development and Reform when he attending the third session of the 12th National People’s Congress in Beijing on March 10.

In 2014, the regional GDP in Ningxia reached 275.21 billion yuan and the per capita figure amounted to 41,835 yuan. The per capita disposable incomes for urban and rural residents totaled 23,285 yuan and 8,410 yuan respectively, Zhang invoked those specific figures. Under the fragile natural environment and vulnerable development basis, it’s really uneasy to achieve such accomplishments, Zhang said.

Compared with developed provinces in eastern China, there is still a long way to go to ensure the presence of a well-off society in Ningxia by 2020 as there are still 700,000 people living in poverty in the middle and southern part of the autonomous region, said Zhang. The industrial structure needs to be readjusted and especially the service industry should be enhanced, he illustrated. We should also make efforts to step up infrastructure construction and strengthen pollution control and energy conservation, he added.

During the upcoming period, we should surmount a lot of difficulties to construct the well-off society in an all-round way, he said. We should deepen reform in key areas and sectors, and promote innovation in management, science and technology and mechanisms to enhance development capacity, Zhang stressed. We set the goal of economic growth rate at eight percent, one percentage point higher than the national average speed, he said. It suits the practical situation and enables Ningxia to catch up with other provinces in a quicker pace, he explained.

He emphasized that Ningxia should accelerate opening-up process, establish a comprehensive opening-up platform, enhance construction of industrial parks and release more supportive policies on opening-up, land exploitation and finance to promote the development of inland opening-up economy and build Ningxia into a pivotal point along the Silk Road, said Ma.