Distinguished guests and colleagues,

I would convey my congratulations on the Third Round of China-South Asia Think Tank Forum (CSATTF). The SIIS is honoured to co-sponsor the conference. I also very much appreciate the forum where the leading scholars of most prestigious thinks tank of South Asia, Southeast Asia and China could gather regularly to compare notes on the topics of common concern and interest for the regional prosperity and stability. Regarding the theme of building Belt and Road towards a Community of Shared interests, I share with many valuable points delivered by previous speakers.

The Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road—now synthesised as the Belt and Road Initiative—is arguably Beijing’s boldest flagship proposal to flesh up its new regional diplomacy and have already bear fruits. By envisioning a new mode of regional and trans-regional economic cooperation, tapping the huge potential for regional and trans-regional investment and trade, and taking advantage of economic complementarities between China and other regional countries, the initiative is expected to further common interests by upgrading regional production, transportation and value chains.

Besides, by following the principles of “wide consultation, joint contribution and shared benefits” (共商、共建、共享) embodied by Vision and Action Plan of the initiative, we believes that the Belt and Road Initiative would exert its spill-over effect on political/security domain and help intensify the regional interdependence and habit of cooperation.

Ambitious as it is, the Belt and Road Initiative is definitely the most complex project Beijing has ever undertaken. For the objective of implementing the Belt and Road Initiative in a smooth, efficient and sustainable way, concerted efforts need to step up to encounter two sets of challenges. The first set of challenges is how to manage the various national economic interests, including diverse priorities of each country’s development agenda and sometimes even competing economic objectives between China and other countries along the Belt and Road.

The second set of challenges is how to handle a plethora of traditional and non-traditional security challenges in the region and beyond which will directly and indirectly disrupt the economic cooperation. Given the legacies of cold war mentality, lingering strategic distrust as well as rising of non-traditional security threats along the parts of Belt and Road, whether and how to build up strong and efficient security cooperation to counter those security challenges and make up a more favourable security environment are on higher agenda. It is also notable that these two sets of challenges, though distinguished on one aspect, are also closely interrelated and mutually enforcing if not handled in a holistic way.

One of keys to these challenges is to strengthen the capacity building of soft ware connectivity (对接)between and among China and related countries, particularly on connectivity of their respective national development strategies. (in Chinese 发展战略对接)

The connectivity of respective development strategies, whether bilateral, trilateral or multilateral, focuses on looking for common ground and areas of cooperation between each other’s development strategies, leading to the formulation of joint plan, facilitating business partnerships, enhancing the institutional synergy, both at bilateral and multilateral levels to improve the institutional collaboration on the basis of proper division of labour etc.

It must be fully recognized and widely shared among all sides that the Belt and Road Initiative is not about one party accepting the plan made by another or one party following the rules set by another. Chinese government has reiterated this point on many occasions.

The significance of connectivity of development strategy between China and its counterparts can never be underestimated. First, countries along the Belt and Road differ in national conditions, political and social institutions, and vary greatly in resources endowment, economic level, and development priority. It is neither realistic nor advisable to frame them against the same set of ideas, plans and model of cooperation. For instances, those flagship projects of cooperation in between China and Central Asia countries must be different from those between China and Southeast Asia. The various economic corridors along the Belt and Road Initiative must also find their unique way of economic cooperation, including roadmap and action plan. Only by building up the connectivity of respective development strategies between China and its counter parts, can both sides identify the existing and potential cooperative areas, making the development blueprints aligned, and promoting the future cooperation in a synchronized and mutually enhancing way.

Second, the process of connectivity of development strategy is to operationalize new concept of development at regional and multilateral level, which stresses the inclusive, sustainable and innovative development based upon equality and holistic view.

Along the Belt and Road Initiative, almost all the countries have made up its own development and economic blueprint or strategy for the medium and long term. Given the growing trade and investment ties between and among all those countries, it is even more imperative than before to streamline their diverse economic strategies and maximizing comparative advantages so that the whole region could upgrade the economic complementarity and integration. For instance, China has engaged actively with Mongolia and Russia for dovetailing Mongolia’s Steppe Road project and Russia’s Euro-Asia Union plan with the Belt and Road Initiative. China has also worked closely with Indonesia government for the alignment with Indonesia’s Maritime Highway initiative. Both Beijing and New Delhi have talked about the possible connectivity between the Belt and Road Initiative and India’s Spice Route and Project Mausam. The more capacity of connectivity in this regard, the more likely that bilateral and multilateral economic cooperation would be framed in a complementary, long term and sustainable way rather than conflicting, short rum and fragmented way.

Third, the working for the connectivity of respective development strategies between China and its counterparts along the Belt and Road Initiative will help build up the strategic confidence and trust in the long run.

The process of connectivity is to explore the common economic interests and expand the list of cooperation between and among different parties. What’s more, as the connectivity of development strategies requires the intensive engagement of a multiple ministries and agencies of respective governments, this process is conducive to the coordination capacity building between the various ministries of China and their counterparts, making the confidence and trust building more likely. Besides, it will also enhance the synergy of multiple stakeholders of government, enterprises, NGOs and general public when capacity building of policy connectivity is underway, thus expanding the overlapped interesting and intensifying the people to people ties.

In order to keep the connectivity of development strategy working, more concerted effort need to be intensified among all related countries. No.1, to maintain the political stability and policy predictability at domestic level are two preconditions for the connectivity of respective development strategy. Without an expectation of and confidence in each other’s political and security stability, it is very hard if not impossible for any meaningful matching of respective economic strategies in long run. Likewise, the volatile and unpredictable business and economic circumstances of any country would also quench the potential inflow of foreign investment and long-term international economic cooperation.

No.2, to have top leaders’ strategic commitment and intensive engagement are indispensable for the efficient connectivity. Past experiences have shown that the strong leadership, particularly the vision and commitment by the top leaders will not only help making up a long-term development strategy at home, but also are capable of mobilizing sufficient resources domestically to facilitate the policy connectivity with its counterparts’ long term strategy. Besides, the strong leadership with strategic vision will help prevent the possible event-based distraction and disruption during the matching and connectivity.  

No.3 to promote the capacity of connectivity of development strategy in an innovative way is the guarantee of sustainable and robust operation. The Belt and Road Initiative is a multidimensional, multilayered and multi-fields project. It is also first of all, a project of multi-stakeholders. The governments, both central and local governments, will largely play the role of making guidelines and vision, providing the public goods such as improving a more transparent and inclusive investment environment, upgrading the legal protection institution at home as well as setting up platforms to facilitate other multi-players partnership. The enterprises are the driving force and the most active players for the connectivity. They should be encouraged to align their individual interests with governmental strategy and the long-term vision of regional economic integration. Without the collaboration and synergy of enterprises and government, the policy connectivity is unable to be operationalized. Multilateral development institutions, including existing and newly emerging ones are also playing key role in this regard. By create new financing channels and new service models, they will leverage more development finance for regional connectivity. The last but not least, without active engagement of other players, including NGOs and think tanks, the implementation of such huge project would be extremely difficult. I am very glad to see the initiative of establishing think tanks network platform of China, South and Southeast Asia and fully support the ideas of enhancing the communications among think tanks to maximize the function of brain storming of those top think tank peoples. I believe that today’s meeting will bring about more constructive and innovative ideas to help translate the vision of the Belt and Road Initiative into more detailed roadmaps and action plans in the future. I also look forward to more fruitful and stimulating discussion today and tomorrow.  Thanks. 

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