Service sector has potential to enhance country's prosperity

China's private sector may have grown at an unprecedented speed, taking advantage of new technologies, efficient capital, skilled labor and sophisticated supply chains. But it is still travelling a path envisaged by late Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping 40 years ago, that is, of an efficient supplier of manufacturing goods to the world.

China's just-ended two sessions have signaled a further boost to the private sector. This has been to the advantage of Chinese entrepreneurs and workers, offshore suppliers and consumers across the world. It has also stimulated industrial development through East Asian countries which are part of the regional supply chains, and helped stabilize prices in the Western world, thanks to China's achievements in green technology (solar photovoltaic cells, wind turbines, lithium batteries and electric vehicles).

But countries with traditional manufacturing industries have found it increasingly hard to compete with advanced economies. Many studies have been conducted by economists, and not all agree on the economic drivers. But they point to the efficiency and scale of Chinese production, support of the government's industrial policy, and home-country automation.