The Houhai area in Nanshan District of Shenzhen, south China's Guangdong Province, September 17, 2020. Photo: Xinhua

China's State Council Information Office on Tuesday issued a white paper to document the country's journey to moderate prosperity. The white paper, titled "China's Epic Journey from Poverty to Prosperity," recounted the extraordinary history of the efforts to build a moderately prosperous society by several generations of Chinese people. It details the remarkable achievement of all-round moderate prosperity and looks into the bright prospects of China's modernization. This important document has touched and inspired ordinary Chinese and conveyed positive energy to the world.

Xiaokang (or moderate prosperity) is a beautiful Chinese word. It was used in documents more than 2,000 years ago to represent an ideal state of society. Throughout China's long history, the Chinese people have suffered wars, chaos, and poverty. Xiaokang expresses the yearnings and expectations of the Chinese people to achieve a moderate prosperity. Today, China has completed the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects and realized the thousand-year-old dream and long-cherished wish of the Chinese nation. This can only be described as a "great achievement".

The white paper points out that a moderately prosperous society in all respects is a society in which all people share the fruits of development, a society where no individual, region or ethnic group is left behind, and a society that promotes the well-rounded development of all. Each of these is essential for achieving common prosperity, a major goal of socialism.

China has achieved the goal of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects. Over 1.4 billion Chinese people, one-fifth of the world's population, have embarked on a new journey to fully build a modern socialist country. This is the unprecedentedly magnificent feat in human history and also a huge contribution to world peace and development. The international public opinion has remarked that, from the perspective of human civilization, China's modernization has created a new path, where China's realization of all-round moderate prosperity is a symbol of the major progress made in human history.

China always keeps its word. China had realized the First Centenary Goal of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects. The CPC has fulfilled its solemn promise to history, to the Chinese people, and to the country. This is also the source of confidence and the pathway to success. Just as the white paper states, the realization of all-round moderate prosperity is "a critical step toward realizing the Chinese Dream of national rejuvenation." Standing on a new historical starting point, the CPC has unified and led the Chinese people in embarking on embarking on a new journey towards socialist modernization, and achieve the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. The Chinese people firmly believe that, by the middle of the 21st century, China will become a great modern socialist country that is prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced, harmonious and beautiful.

Confidence, soberness, pragmatism and perseverance are the keys to China's continuous development miracle. Moving forward for a big country like China is not easy. In the face of great achievements, the CPC has always kept a clearheaded vision of reality. The document says that the principal challenge facing the country now is the gap between unbalanced and inadequate development and the growing expectation of the people for a better life. It is obvious to all that the CPC has always adhered to a people-centered development ideology and has made great efforts to address the problems of unbalanced and inadequate development and the people's urgent needs. And it has resolutely removed obstacles and constraints to achieve common prosperity, fairness and justice.

It should be emphasized that the goal of building a xiaokang society was promoted and realized during China's interactions with the world. China is part of the world, and its development needs the world. China's arm will be more open. China's steady growth has created opportunities for the common development of other countries. China, committed to opening-up, will continue to share the dividends of common development with the rest of the world. A more positive engagement with China must be the right choice for the world in the shadow of the COVID-19 pandemic.