By Ricardo Saludo
INSTEAD of discussing the third kind of “bad faith” driving war and blocking peace in our time, we pause till next week from raging hostilities in West Asia and ponder what could be transformative and progressive directions for East Asia — driven by China — assuming humanity doesn’t go to world war hell.
Celebrated on March 24 to 27 was the 25th anniversary of the Boao Forum for Asia (BFA), the annual conference on regional development and economic integration held at a golf resort and fishing village on China’s southernmost province of Hainan island, about 750 kilometers west of Hong Kong.
Conceived in Boao in 1998 by former national leaders Fidel Ramos of the Philippines, Bob Hawke of Australia and Morihiro Hosokawa of Japan, the proposed Asian counterpart of the World Economic Forum in the skiing town of Davos, Switzerland, got Beijing’s support and was formally launched by 26 founding countries in 2000 with its first conference the following year.
Fast-forward a quarter-century, the BFA has grown in global stature and influence, just like its host. The forum now includes 29 countries and growing, with distinguished participants from new regions, especially in the Global South.
And as BFA board member and former Philippine president Gloria Macapagal Arroyo said in her 25th anniversary remarks, Boao’s rise “mirrors the extraordinary trajectory of China itself. From $1.3 trillion in 2001, when the forum was born, China’s [annual economic output] has trebled to about $20 trillion today with 800 million Chinese lifted out of poverty since reforms began in 1978.”
Transforming China — and Asia
And the best is yet to come for both Boao and China, going by Beijing’s 15th Five-Year Plan for Economic and Social Development, covering 2026–2030 and officially approved in early March by the National People’s Congress (NPC), whose chairman Zhao Leji met on March 25 with the Boao board of directors.
As explained to envoys of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) by Prof. Xu Liping of the National Institute of International Strategy under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, the 15th Five-Year Plan will set China on a new trajectory prioritizing “effective qualitative improvement,” not maximizing growth numbers; “scientific and technological self-reliance, people’s well-being,” including infant and elderly care; “energy conservation and emission reduction,” and for the first time, “energy, food and industrial and supply chain security.”
The plan aims to harness “new quality productive forces” toward “placing more emphasis on the quality and efficiency of development [and] continuous optimization and upgrading of the economic structure to achieve sustainable development,” Professor Zhao explained. Economic expansion is moderated to 4.5 percent to 5 percent, down from 5 percent, “ensuring growth speed is compatible with the carrying capacity of resources and the environment.”
To build self-reliance in key technology areas, research and development (R&D) spending is aimed to reach 3.2 percent of gross domestic product (GDP), with priority R&D investments in semiconductors, artificial intelligence, quantum computing, biomanufacturing and sixth-generation telecommunications.
On green transition, the plan seeks 17-percent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions per unit of GDP by 2030 and increase of nonfossil fuel energy to a quarter of total consumption. And there will be incentives for households and businesses to trade in old appliances, equipment and transport for green and smart alternatives.
With the emphasis on people’s well-being in a rapidly aging population, growth is expected in such sectors as health care, elderly services and biotechnology. HSBC projects this “silver economy” to generate 23 percent of GDP by 2035.
Summing up the plan highlights, Professor Zhang speaks of four Chinas:
“Digital China: Enhance the level of digital and intelligent development. Beautiful China: Lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets, strengthen the momentum of green development. Health China: Promote the shift from a treatment-centered approach to a health-centered approach. Security China: Create a new security architecture, enhance our strategic initiative in maintaining and shaping national security.”
What’s in it for Asean?
With China’s major economic and development shifts in coming years and decades and despite the tech self-reliance goal, the plan aims to join hands with other nations and regions.
Hence, another buzzword along with technology, green and people’s well-being: openness with mutual benefit and shared future. Notably, the last two words are also the theme of BFA’s 25th anniversary conference.
No surprise then that Professor Zhang’s report has a second part, titled “China-Asean Cooperation Opportunities: Exploring paths for deepened cooperation between both sides in many sectors under the background of the 15th Five-Year Plan.”
Noting that China-Asean trade now exceeds $1 trillion and China has been the 10-nation group’s leading trading partner for consecutive years, Professor Zhang cites as “convergence points” that the “Asean is viewed as an extension of China’s economic ecosystem. A key manufacturing platform for regional supply chains. A strategic interface connecting to the global economy.”
A further view is that as China moves up the value chain into high-end manufacturing, including robotics, electric vehicles and aerospace, it is outsourcing lower-end manufacturing to Southeast Asia.
China also aims to become the primary provider of affordable green tech — solar, wind, batteries — for the region, since Chinese R&D and production costs can be defrayed in the huge domestic market even before exports to the Asean. Also nuclear power, including small plants ideal for distributed generating capacity. And it can also be a standard-setter and major supplier in AI and AI-enabled technologies.
As a leading interface between Asian nations, the Boao Forum stands to play a major role in building China-Asean linkages for the region to plug into and benefit from the 15th Five-Year Plan development priorities. Chinese and Asean enterprises able to serve China’s new thrusts can meet and collaborate through the BFA.
So can Asean entities needing green tech, AI, robotics and the like from Chinese suppliers. And the Asean should be heard in China’s standard-setting and risk management deliberations for AI and other autonomous systems.
As we brace for West Asia war fallout, let’s also be ready for East Asia’s transformational surge powered by China.
Ricardo Saludo
Ricardo Saludo served as Cabinet Secretary and head of the Presidential Management Staff under President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.He earned his Master of Science (MS) degree, major in public policy and management, from the University of London after completing his Bachelor’s Degree in Literature, cum laude. Presently Saludo is co-founder and managing director of the Center for Strategy, Enterprise, and Intelligence and lecturer at the National College of Public Administration and Governance of the University of the Philippines teaching the course The Administrator in the Philippine Public Service.
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