Cultural and Creative Industries: New Engine for Economic Growth

Promote China’s Economic Transformation

In September 2009, the Cultural Industry Revitalization Plan, the first of its kind in China, was ratified. It signified the elevation of the cultural industry to a national strategic industry. According to the plan, China has given preference to the CCI sector, which includes cultural creativity and design, film and television production, publishing and distribution, performing arts and entertainment, cultural exhibitions, advertising, and the animation industry.

The recently unveiled 13th Five-Year Plan also emphasizes making CCI a pillar industry. It is indeed expected to become a new economic growth point, and a new engine to propel economic restructuring and industrial upgrading.

Cultural and creative industries will indeed become a new growth point of China’s economy. As the global financial crisis seriously affected traditional industries such as finance and real estate, amid the resultant long-term economic stagnation, countries across the world have readjusted their economic development strategies and searched for new growth points.

The CCI feature high industrial integration, soaring demand, and strong innovative capacity. They are thus perfectly in line with China’s goal, in the context of the “new normal,” of ensuring growth, expanding domestic demand, and promoting employment. Against this backdrop, the CCI sector has become a highlight of economic growth.

According to the National Bureau of Statistics, the added value of China’s cultural and creative industries increased from RMB 1.1052 trillion in 2010 to RMB 2.7235 trillion in 2015, representing an expanded share in GDP from 2.75 percent to 3.82 percent. In terms of the growth rate, the CCI sector in China achieved 11 percent in 2015, higher than the macroeconomic level. That in Beijing, Shanghai, Jiangsu, and Guangdong accounts for more than 5 percent of local GDP. Cultural and creative industries have thus become a main impetus for promoting China’s economic growth and optimizing its structure.

Cultural and creative industries have accelerated China’s economic restructuring. In the past three decades China made great economic and social achievements, with average annual growth of more than 10 percent. Against the backdrop of supply shortage, a comparatively low industrialization level, and cheaper labor costs, investments and exports were a main force in developing the economy, building the industrial system, and improving people’s livelihood.

Along with the social and economic changes, however, the drawbacks to this economic pattern emerged. Excessive investment led to serious excess capacity in some sectors, resulting in low productivity and serious economic imbalances. The old industrial development pattern, featuring high energy consumption and hence high pollution, also had serious impact on the environment. Large-scale investment moreover increased government debts, and over-reliance on exports made the Chinese economy vulnerable to cyclical changes in the global economy.

The cultural and creative industries tally perfectly with China’s current demand to transform its economic growth mode and upgrade its industrial structure. They will therefore offset the drawbacks to the outdated extensive growth pattern.

The main investment elements in the cultural and creative industries are intellectual resources and fruits; their dependence on material resources is lower. The green, low-carbon CCI sector thus has dual significance in modern economy. On the one hand, it is an important part of modern services, and on the other, it has a strong capacity for integration, penetration and radiation that can help to develop and upgrade relevant industries.

In March 2014, the State Council promulgated the document elevating industries related to culture, innovation, and design and promoting their integration and upgrading. The document aims to speed up CCI’s fusion with other aspects of the economy, including manufacturing, construction, tourism, agriculture, and sports industry. In fact, these trends are now clearly apparent.

The cultural and creative industries also help to expand the consumption scale and promote the consumption structure. China is embracing a new type of economic growth mode that focuses on domestic consumption, which it regards as a driving force for sustainable growth.

A prosperous CCI sector will enlarge domestic demand and consumption. In its recent survey of 160,000 households in 31 provincial regions, the National Bureau of Statistics found that, in 2014, per capita consumption expenditure increased year-on-year by 9.6 percent (excluding price fluctuations), of which per capita expenditure on culture and entertainment showed an increase of 16.4 percent. Cultural expenditure thus achieved average growth of more than 12 percent from 2011 to 2014. Along with a rising per capita GDP and household disposable income, the proportion of cultural consumption will increase further, so once again optimizing the consumption structure.