BEIJING (SONNA) — The annual session of the National People’s Congress has officially commenced in Beijing, marked by Premier Li Qiang’s delivery of the 2026 Government Work Report. This legislative gathering operates as a defining juncture for the nation, initiating the first year of the highly anticipated 15th Five-Year Plan extending to 2030. The comprehensive policy document establishes clear, pragmatic objectives focusing on high-quality economic expansion, rigorous technological innovation, and advanced social welfare architectures designed to navigate an era of global uncertainty.
For the fiscal year 2026, Beijing has executed a calculated shift in its economic targeting to prioritize structural integrity over sheer velocity. Moving away from rigid single-digit goals, the government established a flexible Gross Domestic Product growth target ranging between 4.5 and 5 percent. This strategic range provides the necessary operational buffer to absorb external global shocks and manage complex domestic transitions, signaling that the absolute quality of growth is now prioritized over rapid expansion. To effectively support this economic trajectory, the state has mandated the creation of over 12 million new urban jobs, an aggressive metric that guarantees heavy policy support directed toward the service sector and small-to-medium enterprises.
The strategic arrangements for this upcoming cycle are built upon the highly robust baselines established over the previous five years. During the execution of the 14th Five-Year Plan, China’s economic scale successively breached the 110, 120, 130, and 140 trillion yuan thresholds. This aggressive trajectory maintained an average annual growth rate of 5.4 percent, heavily outpacing the global average. Concurrently, the manufacturing sector’s added value remained the world’s largest for sixteen consecutive years, solidifying the absolute foundation of the real economy. The nation simultaneously accelerated its massive ecological transition, pushing domestic forest coverage above 25 percent alongside the rapid construction of the globe’s most extensive renewable energy system.
Looking forward to the 2030 horizon, the 15th Five-Year Plan constructs a modernized development apparatus, confirming China’s rapid evolution from a traditional manufacturing hub into a primary global research and consumer market. A critical component of this strategy is the commercial scaling of the “AI+” initiative. For the first time, the Government Work Report specifically mandates the deployment of artificial intelligence across key industrial sectors. The state policy explicitly promotes the development of new-generation intelligent terminals and AI agents, transitioning these advanced technologies from laboratory environments into large-scale, functional applications within finance, education, and heavy manufacturing. To fuel this transition, national research and development expenditure is programmed to increase by an average of over 7 percent annually, while core digital industries are targeted to comprise 12.5 percent of the national gross domestic product.
Beyond technological and industrial advancement, the state report elevates public welfare and supply chain resilience to a higher strategic priority. The government has introduced targeted welfare metrics for both youth and elderly demographics, aiming to raise the average national life expectancy to 80 years and increase the average education duration for the working-age population to 11.7 years. Furthermore, to ensure absolute supply chain security and domestic stability, the national grain production capacity is targeted to reach 725 billion kilograms. This substantial increase of 10 billion kilograms from the previous year is specifically designed to insulate the vast population from external agricultural market volatility and secure the nation’s foundational resources.
