History is the basis of reality and the source of the future. By “looking back” on the development of service industry, we can better realize “looking forward”: to explore the general trend of service industry. The analysis of the characteristics and trends of the development of China’s service industry since the twenty-first century can provide a logical basis for the analysis of the general trend of the development of the service industry. Revealing the transformation of China’s industrial structure from industrial dominance to service dominance and its impact on economic development can provide a new perspective for a better understanding of the new normal of economic development. The formation of dominant position of service industry leads to the importance and urgency of strengthening service industry statistics.
In today’s world, the service industry has increasingly become the engine of sustainable economic and social development, and the driving force for upgrading the quality and efficiency of industries and transforming the development mode. At present, China’s service industry has surpassed the secondary industry to become the industry that accounts for the highest proportion of GDP and creates the most jobs in the tertiary industry. In this context, it is of great significance to accurately grasp the new normal of economic development, better understand the new normal, adapt to the new normal and lead the new normal by scientifically studying and judging the general trend of service industry development in connection with the changes in the development environment at home and abroad. The essence of studying and judging the general trend of service industry development is to solve the problem of “looking forward” of service industry development. By “looking back” on the development of service industry and grasping its development status, it is helpful to realize “looking forward” better. In view of this, this chapter will review and look forward to the development of China’s service industry. Unless otherwise specified, the term “service industry” is used in this chapter the same sense as the tertiary industry.
1 China’s Service Industry Development in Retrospect
1.1 The Service Sector Expanded Rapidly and Contributed Significantly to Economic Growth
From 2000 to 2014, the added value of the service industry in China increased from 3871.40 billion Yuan to 30,673.87 billion Yuan at current prices, an increase of 6.9 times (see Table 1 and Fig. 1). The added value of the service sector in China at constant prices in 2005 increased from 4548.84 billion Yuan to 18,220.11 billion Yuan, an increase of 3.0 times and significantly faster than that in the last decade of the twentieth century. From 1990 to 2000, the added value of China’s service sector increased by 1.6 times. According to the five-year plan period, the tenth Five-Year Plan period, the eleventh Five-Year Plan period and the first four years of the twelfth Five-Year Plan period, the annual growth rate of value-added in the service sector in China at 2005 prices was 10.5, 11.9 and 8.5%, respectively, exceeding the growth rate of 0.7, 0.7 and 0.5 percentage points of GDP in the same period. In recent years, under the background of increasing downward pressure on China’s economic growth, the added value of the service sector has maintained a steady and rapid growth. In the first four years of the twelfth Five-Year Plan, the annual growth rate of the added value of the service sector exceeded that of the secondary industry by 0.2 percentage points. In 2014, the service sector’s contribution to GDP exceeded 50% for the first time, reaching 50.8%, becoming a major driving force for economic growth.
Table 1
Changes in China’s GDP and the added value of the secondary and tertiary industries since 2000 (Unit: 100 million Yuan)
Year | Calculate at constant 2005 prices | Calculate at prices of current year | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
GDP of secondary industry and tertiary industry | Secondary industry | Tertiary industry | GDP of secondary industry and tertiary industry | Secondary industry | Tertiary industry | |
2000 | 116,114.4 | 52,416.2 | 45,488.4 | 99,214.6 | 45,555.9 | 38,714.0 |
2001 | 125,752.3 | 56,840.9 | 50,154.3... | |||