China expected to continue win-win solutions for world development: World Bank

The world expects China to chart a different path of development and spread its development lessons all around the globe, said World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim as he spoke highly of China's win-win solutions on the 40th anniversary of its reform and opening-up.

China entered the World Bank Group in 1980 as the country started to engage more widely in the global economic system. With this year marking the 40th anniversary since the beginning of China's reform and opening-up process, the World Bank chief also praised China's achievements over the past decades.

Speaking in an interview with China Global Television Network (CGTN), Kim said the relationship between China and the World Bank Group has evolved over the years.

"At first we were involved in things like setting up the special economic zones, in establishing the capital markets. But then China joined the World Trade Organization, another very important step in China's development. And recently we are now focusing with China on specific areas that it has set for itself as targets for improvements," said the World Bank chief.

He also listed a few areas of focus including the change in economic growth strategy, urbanization and health care, which have seen some of the biggest reform.

Kim noted that China's role in the World Bank Group has also changed over the years, evolving from being a recipient of loans and assistance, to becoming a major contributor and donor.

"China has now become much more interested in our knowledge and our knowledge is unique at the World Bank Group because what we are hoping to provide for every single country is we take all the experiences that we've had, all the things that we've learned from countries all around the world and then bring them to see if any of these examples of success and failure might be relevant. So we do the same thing for China. But now China has become an extremely important source of just those kinds of innovations. So we are now taking the lessons from China and helping to spread those lessons all over the world. So China has become much more of a knowledge partner than before. But China has also become a donor," said Kim.

The World Bank chief added that China has been one of the fastest-growing countries in terms of donations to the International Development Association (IDA), the World Bank's fund for the poorest countries.

As China now has greater voting power at the World Bank, Kim said the rest of the world is now looking towards China for leadership in setting the tone for how future global development will evolve.

"President Xi has said on many occasions that what China is looking for are win-win solutions. And so with the Belt and Road Initiative, and with the direct assistance, the provision of loans from China directly to countries, I think all of those things, everyone in the world is waiting and hoping and expecting that China will continue to emphasize this notion of win-win solutions and chart a path for development that will look different," he said.

Kim said different from the traditional development path where wealthy countries provide grants and loans to the poor countries, China is proposing solutions that everyone will benefit if they work together on developing the poorest countries.

He is optimistic about China's development in the future.

"That approach of using small and medium enterprises to drive economic growth and job creation is fully alive and functioning in China. Automation, heavy industry is fully alive and functioning in China. China is trying to get the right balance between state intervention, the use of state resources, and market forces and these things are all central to how China will do in the future," said Kim.

The World Bank chief said that his optimism is based on the fact that there are so many different drivers of economic growth already thriving in China, and believes the country has a good chance of continuing to grow whatever global or political challenges it faces.

"I think that the most important message I can send on this 40th anniversary of China opening to the world is that China is now communicating about a leadership strategy that's very different from the traditional leadership strategy. It's not about rich countries providing benefits to poor countries. It's about a country that has gone from being extremely poor to much wealthier in a very short period of time now saying 'we need to find win-win situations.' This is what we do at the world bank every single day -- can we find win-win situations? This is something that we look forward to continuing to do with China," said Kim.