Continuously Deepen Reform to Promote Deep Integration of the Real and Digital Economies

The Third Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China sounded the clarion call for further deepening reforms across the board, proposing that "high-quality development is the primary task in building a modern socialist country in all respects" and making specific arrangements for "improving the institutions and mechanisms for developing new quality productive forces in light of local conditions," especially "improving the institutions for promoting deep integration of the real economy and the digital economy." This provides a clear strategic orientation for cultivating and developing new quality productive forces and accelerating high-quality economic development on the new journey. At present, digital technology has entered an accelerated innovation explosion period and is deeply embedded in every link of production, distribution, exchange, and consumption. It continuously empowers the transformation and upgrading of traditional industries, spawns new industries, new business forms, and new models, and has become a strategic engine for China to seize development high ground, open up new development tracks, shape new competitive advantages, and accumulate new development momentum, demonstrating broad development potential. Therefore, continuously improving the institutions for promoting deep integration of the real economy and the digital economy, and taking deep integration of the real and digital economies as the main line to accelerate the development of new quality productive forces, will inject a continuous and powerful impetus into advancing Chinese-path modernization.

党的二十届三中全会吹响了进一步全面深化改革的冲锋号，提出“高质量发展是全面建设社会主义现代化国家的首要任务”，并对“健全因地制宜发展新质生产力体制机制”特别是“健全促进实体经济和数字经济深度融合制度”作出具体部署，为新征程培育和发展新质生产力、加快经济高质量发展提供了明确的战略导向。当前，数字技术已进入加速创新爆发期，并深度嵌入生产、分配、交换和消费的各个环节，不断赋能传统产业转型升级，催生新产业新业态新模式，成为我国抢占发展制高点、开辟发展新赛道、塑造竞争新优势、积蓄发展新动能的战略引擎，展现出广阔的发展潜力。因此，不断健全促进实体经济和数字经济深度融合制度，以“实数”深度融合为主线加快发展新质生产力，将为推进中国式现代化注入源源不断的强劲动能。

Promoting the integrated development of the real and digital economies through reform

在改革中推动“实数”融合发展

The Third Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the CPC highlighted that the real economy is the foundation and lifeblood of the national economy, and emphasized that the digital economy must empower the real economy to achieve "strengthening the real with the digital" rather than "shifting from the real to the virtual." The integration of the real and digital economies is not about blindly, superficially, or mechanically applying digital transformation. Instead, it takes digitalized knowledge and information as key production factors and uses new-generation digital technologies such as cloud computing, artificial intelligence, blockchain, and the Internet of Things as core driving forces. These technologies run through, lead, and profoundly change the development model and growth logic of the real economy, achieving resource optimization over a broader scope, deeper changes in production methods, and higher-level value creation, thereby effectively enhancing the independent innovation capability and international competitiveness of the real economy. The positive interaction, mutual complementarity, and mutual promotion between the real economy and the digital economy help cultivate and expand new quality productive forces.

党的二十届三中全会突出了实体经济是国民经济立身之本和命脉所在，强调了数字经济必须赋能实体经济，实现“以数强实”而非“脱实向虚”。“实数”融合发展不是进行盲目、表层、机械的数字化应用转型，而是以数字化的知识和信息为关键生产要素，以云计算、人工智能、区块链、物联网等新一代数字技术为核心驱动力，贯穿引领并深刻改变实体经济发展模式和增长逻辑，实现更广范围资源优化配置、更深程度生产方式变革、更高水平价值创造，切实提高实体经济的自主创新能力和国际竞争力。实体经济与数字经济的良性互动、相辅相成、互促互进，有助于培育壮大新质生产力。

From the perspective of global trends, digital technology and the digital economy represent the lead in the world's technological revolution and industrial transformation. The digital economy is characterized by high innovativeness, strong penetration, and wide coverage. Its development speed, radiation range, and depth of impact are unprecedented. It has driven major changes in production methods, lifestyles, and ways of thinking, profoundly reshaping the global economic landscape and the pattern of international forces, and has become a key force in promoting the development of productive forces. In the face of new trends in technological revolution and new directions in industrial transformation, it is necessary to place the promotion of deep integration of the real and digital economies in an important strategic position, empower the construction of a modern industrial system with the digital economy, achieve "changing lanes to overtake" and "changing tracks to lead," and win the initiative in future development.

从全球浪潮看，数字技术、数字经济是世界科技革命和产业变革的先机。数字经济具有高创新性、强渗透性、广覆盖性的特点，其发展速度之快、辐射范围之广、影响程度之深前所未有，推动了生产方式、生活方式和思维方式的重大变革，深刻重塑了全球经济版图和国际力量格局，已成为推动生产力发展的关键性力量。面对技术革命新动向、产业变革新趋势，必须把促进实体经济和数字经济深度融合摆在重要战略位置，以数字经济赋能现代化产业体系建设，实现“变道超车”“换道领跑”，赢得未来发展主动权。

Looking at the actual situation, the development of China's digital economy has seen both quantitative growth and qualitative improvement. The digital transformation of traditional industries has been advanced in depth. New industries, models, and business forms have become an important force in national economic growth. At the same time, some shortcomings and weaknesses still constrain the process of integrating the real and digital economies in China. Promoting deep integration of the real and digital economies requires not only innovation at the level of technology and business forms but also changes at the management and institutional levels. This calls for stimulating comprehensive vitality in technological innovation, industrial innovation, management innovation, and model innovation, releasing the multiplier, superposition, and catalytic effects of data elements and their innovation potential, promoting the rapid emergence of new quality productive forces with strategic emerging industries and future industries as core carriers, and pushing high-quality development to a new level.

从现实情况看，我国数字经济发展量质齐升，传统产业数字化改造纵深推进，新产业、新模式、新业态已成为国民经济增长的重要力量。与此同时，一些短板弱项仍然制约着我国“实数”融合发展进程。促进“实数”深度融合，既离不开技术和业态模式层面的创新，更呼唤管理和制度层面的变革。这就要求激发技术创新、产业创新、管理创新、模式创新等全方位活力，释放数据要素的放大、叠加、倍增作用和创新潜能，推动以战略性新兴产业和未来产业为核心载体的新质生产力加速涌现，推动高质量发展迈上新台阶。

An important fulcrum for developing new quality productive forces

发展新质生产力的重要抓手

The integration of the real and digital economies opens up new pathways for driving breakthrough technological innovation. In terms of improving research efficiency, digital technologies such as big data, artificial intelligence, virtual mapping, and high-precision simulation have been deeply embedded in processes such as technology R&D, pilot testing, and achievement transformation in the real economy. This effectively improves traditional innovation process management and significantly reduces the search costs, research cycles, and uncertainty risks of scientific and technological innovation. In terms of expanding the breadth of knowledge, the integration of the real and digital economies breaks down the boundaries and barriers between technologies, promotes the efficient diffusion and dissemination of technological knowledge in codified forms within the industrial chain, and widens the spatial and temporal boundaries of knowledge spillovers and emerging technology applications. In terms of deepening collaborative innovation, digital platforms stimulate the industrial chain to establish a broader and closer interactive collaborative innovation ecological chain. By connecting the innovation chain, industrial chain, capital chain, and talent chain based on the data chain, it achieves cross-regional and cross-industry sharing of innovation resources, effectively solving problems such as insufficient computing power, technology islands, and lack of application scenarios. The integrated innovation capability formed by cross-border technological integration will also allow more original and disruptive scientific and technological innovations to emerge fully.

“实数”融合为推动突破性科技创新开辟新路径。在提升科研效率方面，大数据、人工智能、虚拟映射、高精度仿真模拟等数字技术已深度嵌入实体经济的技术研发、试验中试、成果转化等过程，有效改善了传统的创新流程管理，大幅降低了科技创新的搜寻成本、攻关周期和不确定风险。在扩展知识宽度方面，“实数”融合打破了技术之间的边界壁垒，促进了技术知识以可编码形式在产业链间高效扩散传播，拓宽了知识溢出和新兴技术应用的时空范围边界。在深化协同创新方面，数字平台激发产业链建立更大范围、更为紧密的交互协同创新生态链，基于数据链打通创新链、产业链、资金链、人才链，实现了创新资源的跨区域和跨行业的共享，有效解决了算力不足、技术孤岛、应用场景匮乏等难题，技术跨界融合所形成的集成创新能力还将使更多原创性、颠覆性科技创新成果充分涌现。

The integration of the real and digital economies injects new momentum into promoting the transformation and upgrading of traditional industries. From the supply side, digital technology accelerates the digital, intelligent, and green transformation of traditional industries. It extensively applies digital intelligence technologies and green technologies to carry out transformation and upgrading, promoting equipment renewal, process upgrading, product innovation, service upgrading, and lean management, driving a substantial leap in total factor productivity. From the demand side, traditional industries can use digital technology to gain more flexible, efficient, and accurate insight into market demands, discover potential market opportunities and innovation points, form precisely matched production and sales networks, and meet consumers' increasingly diverse and high-quality needs. The integration of the real and digital economies will bring comprehensive, full-angle, and whole-chain changes to traditional industries, continuously increasing their "content of innovation, greenness, and gold content," making them an important representative for developing new quality productive forces.

“实数”融合为推动传统产业转型升级注入新动能。从供给端看，数字技术加速了传统产业数字化、智能化、绿色化转型，广泛应用数智技术、绿色技术实施改造升级，推动设备更新、工艺升级、产品创新、服务升级以及精益管理，带动全要素生产率大幅跃升。从需求端看，传统产业借助数字技术能够更灵活、更高效、更精准地洞察市场需求，发掘潜在的市场机会和创新点，形成精准匹配的产销网络，满足消费者日益增长的多元化、高品质需求。“实数”融合将对传统产业带来全方位、全角度、全链条变革，不断提升传统产业的“含新量”“含绿量”“含金量”，使之成为发展新质生产力的重要代表。

The integration of the real and digital economies creates a new engine for promoting cross-industry cooperation. This integration drives a profound "integration revolution" among industries, injecting new vitality into the organic linkage and cross-industry cooperation of multidimensional industries on a broader scale, in wider fields, and at deeper levels. This industrial integration expands the boundaries of the traditional economy and promotes the reshaping of industrial forms. In particular, new models such as the sharing economy, platform economy, cloud manufacturing, and cross-border e-commerce continue to emerge. New business forms such as smart agriculture, smart logistics, smart healthcare, and online education are flourishing. Strategic emerging industries and future industries such as new-generation information technology, humanoid robots, quantum information, blockchain, biotechnology, and the low-altitude economy have emerged as required. These have already shown great development potential and have become important carriers of new quality productive forces and key drivers of future economic growth.

“实数”融合为推动产业跨界合作打造新引擎。“实数”融合推动产业间进行深刻的“融合革命”，为多维产业在更大范围、更宽领域、更深层次的有机联动与跨界合作注入新活力。这种产业融合拓展了传统经济的边界，促进了产业形态的重塑。特别是共享经济、平台经济、云制造、跨境电商等新模式不断涌现，智慧农业、智慧物流、智慧医疗、在线教育等新业态蓬勃发展，新一代信息技术、人形机器人、量子信息、区块链、生物技术、低空经济等战略性新兴产业和未来产业应运而生，已经展现出巨大发展潜力，并成为新质生产力的重要载体和未来经济增长的关键驱动力。

Improving the policy system for deep integration of the real and digital economies

健全“实数”深度融合政策体系

First, focus on improving the policy system for leading digital technology innovation. Achieving a leap from catching up to leading in digital technology is not only key to stimulating the emergence of more disruptive scientific and technological innovations, but also a solid cornerstone for China to seize the initiative in development and achieve self-reliance and strength in science and technology. Therefore, it is necessary to leverage the advantages of the new nationwide system for mobilizing resources [3]3 The new nationwide system for mobilizing resources (xīnxíng jǔguó tǐzhì) is a mechanism for concentrating national strength to achieve breakthroughs in strategic scientific and technological fields., strengthen the layout of strategic scientific and technological forces in the digital technology field, scientifically coordinate, concentrate resources, carefully deploy, and implement a number of major science and technology projects, and concentrate efforts to overcome a number of original and leading digital technology "choke point" problems [2]2 "Choke point" problems (kǎ bó zǐ) is a Chinese idiom referring to core technologies or key links that are controlled by foreign entities and constrain China's development.. Highlight strategic, overall, and forward-looking basic research, focus on cutting-edge fields such as high-end chips, industrial software, quantum computing, blockchain algorithms, and digital twins, and create more "hard-core technologies" that lead the development of new quality productive forces. Coordinate the integrated reform of the education, science and technology, and talent systems and mechanisms, improve the working mechanisms for talent introduction, training, use, and evaluation, and cultivate more strategic scientists, first-class scientific and technological leaders, and industrial skill talents such as information engineers, data analysts, and digital craftsmen, providing intellectual support for the integration of the real and digital economies.

一是着力完善引领数字技术创新的政策体系。实现数字技术从跟跑到领跑的跨越，不仅是激发更多颠覆性科技创新成果涌现的关键所在，更是我国掌握发展主动权、实现科技自立自强的坚实基石。因此要发挥新型举国体制优势，强化数字技术领域战略科技力量布局，科学统筹、集中力量、精心部署和实施一批重大科技项目攻关，集中攻克一批原创性、引领性数字技术“卡脖子”难题。突出战略性、全局性、前瞻性加强基础研究，聚焦高端芯片、工业软件、量子计算、区块链算法、数字孪生等前沿领域，打造更多引领新质生产力发展的“硬核科技”。统筹推进教育科技人才体制机制一体改革，完善人才引进、培养、使用、评价的工作机制，培养造就更多战略科学家、一流科技领军人才等科技人才和信息工程师、数据分析师、数字工匠等产业技能人才，为实数融合发展提供智力支持。

Second, focus on improving the policy system for promoting digital industrialization and industrial digitalization. Digital industrialization and industrial digitalization are important directions for the integration of the real and digital economies. Therefore, it is necessary to establish and improve relevant policies to encourage the "intelligent transformation, digital transformation, and network connectivity" [4]4 "Intelligent transformation, digital transformation, and network connectivity" (zhì gǎi shù zhuǎn wǎng lián) is a shorthand for the policy direction of upgrading manufacturing through intelligentization, digitalization, and networking. of the manufacturing industry, deeply carry out the special action of digital empowerment for small and medium-sized enterprises, build more flexible production lines, digital workshops, and smart manufacturing factories, and achieve the goals of widespread application of 5G, deep empowerment of AI, full-data-driven operations, and secure and controllable industrial Internet. Issue action plans to guide enterprises in carrying out "AI+ actions," promote the cross-border integration of existing business forms and digital business forms, open up new fields, new chains, and new tracks for emerging and future industries such as brain-like intelligence, quantum information, gene technology, deep-sea and deep-space development, and continuously enrich and expand the application scenarios of the integration of the real and digital economies.

二是着力完善促进数字产业化和产业数字化的政策体系。数字产业化和产业数字化是实数融合的重要方向。因此要建立健全激励制造业“智改数转网联”的相关政策，深入开展中小企业数字化赋能专项行动，打造更多柔性生产线、数字化车间和智能制造工厂，实现5G广泛应用、AI深度赋能、数据全面驱动、工业互联网安全可控的目标。出台引导企业开展“人工智能+”行动方案，推动现有业态和数字业态跨界融合，开辟类脑智能、量子信息、基因技术、深海空天开发等新兴产业与未来产业的新领域、新链条、新赛道，持续丰富和拓展实数融合应用场景。

Third, focus on improving the policy system for marketization of data elements. Data is a high-quality production factor for forming new quality productive forces. Therefore, it is necessary to coordinate the promotion of key projects such as "east-to-west computing resource transfer" [5]5 "East-to-west computing resource transfer" (dōng shù xī suàn) is a national project to transfer computing resource demand from the eastern regions to the western regions, which have abundant energy and lower costs. and "land-sea computing resource integration" [6]6 "Land-sea computing resource integration" (lù shù hǎi suàn) refers to a complementary project that deploys computing infrastructure both on land and under the sea to optimize resource allocation., as well as the deployment and construction of digital computing infrastructure such as 5G and the industrial Internet, accelerate the formation of a national integrated computing power system, and achieve inclusive, efficient, and flexible computing power service supply. Actively promote the development, opening, circulation, and use of data, build high-level big data trading centers at a high level, explore the implementation of more data application scenarios, break information silos and data gaps, and achieve interconnection and orderly flow of data information across multiple industries, multiple fields, multiple departments, and multiple levels. Improve the trading rules and services for data elements, enhance the regulatory level of data element trading, and focus on solving problems such as "difficulty in rights confirmation," "difficulty in use," "difficulty in sharing," and "difficulty in trading" in the process of data aggregation, processing, circulation, trading, and sharing, so as to maximize the mining and release of data value and potential.

三是着力完善数据要素市场化的政策体系。数据是形成新质生产力的优质生产要素。因此要统筹推进“东数西算”“陆数海算”等重点工程和5G、工业互联网等数字算力基础设施的部署建设，加快形成全国一体化算力体系，实现普惠、高效、灵活的算力服务供给。积极推动数据开发开放和流通使用，高水平建设大数据交易中心，探索开展更多数据落地应用场景，打破信息孤岛和数据鸿沟，实现多行业、多领域、跨部门、跨层级的数据信息互联互通、有序流动。完善数据要素交易规则和服务，提升数据要素交易监管水平，着力破解数据汇聚、处理、流通、交易、共享过程中的“确权难”“使用难”“分享难”“交易难”等问题，最大化挖掘释放数据价值和潜力。

Fourth, focus on improving the policy system for ensuring the integrated development of the real and digital economies. To develop new quality productive forces, it is necessary to form new production relations that are compatible with them. Deepen the reform of the financial system, guide financial institutions to optimize products and services, support the construction of digital technology and industrial funds, and form a virtuous cycle of effective interconnection among "technology, industry, and finance." Promote the construction of a unified national market and a high-standard market system, improve the governance system for the integration of the real and digital economies including social credit, property rights protection, competition rules, market supervision, and security evaluation, break down regional barriers and market segmentation, and create a fair competitive market environment and a stable and predictable business environment. Continue to promote high-level opening up, actively participate in the formulation of technical standards and rules in the global digital field, deepen the international exchange and cooperation mechanisms in the fields of digital innovation and digital trade, and expand the development space for new quality productive forces. Improve the data privacy protection system and security review system, formulate network and data security standards and norms, strengthen the protection of government data, enterprise trade secrets, and personal data, and ensure the deep integrated development of the real and digital economies with high-level digital security.

四是着力完善保障实数融合发展的政策体系。发展新质生产力，必须形成与之相适应的新型生产关系。深化金融体制改革，引导金融机构优化产品和服务，支持数字科技与产业基金建设，形成“科技—产业—金融”有效贯通的良性循环。推进全国统一大市场和高标准市场体系建设，完善社会信用、产权保护、竞争规则、市场监管、安全评价等在内的实数融合治理体系，打破区域壁垒和市场分割，营造公平竞争的市场环境和稳定可预期的营商环境。持续推进高水平对外开放，积极参与全球数字领域技术标准、规则制定，深化数字创新、数字贸易领域国际交流合作机制，扩展新质生产力发展空间。完善数据隐私保护制度和安全审查制度，制定网络和数据安全标准规范，强化对政务数据、企业商业秘密和个人数据的保护，以高水平数字安全护航“实数”深度融合发展。

(The author is Vice President and Researcher of the Guangdong Academy of Social Sciences, and specially invited researcher of the Guangdong Research Center for Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era)

（作者系广东省社会科学院副院长、研究员，广东省习近平新时代中国特色社会主义思想研究中心特约研究员）

Online editor: Huihui

网络编辑：慧慧