Editor's Note: Beijing Winter Olympics is drawing to a close, through which China shows its development to the world.  China has been advocating the Belt and Road initiative, and has been making continuous efforts to build it. Let's take a look at China's development and contribution to the world at today's Global Focus.

1. Beijing Winter Olympics showcases China's development to world: experts

The Beijing 2022 Olympic Winter Games has provided a comprehensive presentation of China's development philosophy and achievements, as well as its ideas on international relations and people-to-people exchanges, experts said at a seminar on Thursday. At the online seminar titled "Winter Olympics: Beijing Spirit and Global Implications," experts and scholars in sports, public management, economics and other fields shared their studies on the Games.

Though their studies focused on different aspects of the Games, many of the experts expressed similar views of how the Games reflected China's achievements in fields such as technological development and environmental protection.

2. China employs digital technology for rural vitalization

From controlling humidity and ventilation in vegetable greenhouses via smart phones, to establishing household digital files of garbage sorting to reward the farmers who sort garbage, and to providing public services on online platforms, digital rural construction is injecting a strong impetus into China's rural vitalization.

Promoting the construction of digital villages is an important means to realize rural vitalization. It is also vital for building a digital China.

According to an action plan for the development of digital villages between 2022 and 2025 recently issued by the Chinese government, actions will be taken to upgrade digital infrastructure, innovate and develop intelligent agriculture, develop new types and models of businesses, enhance digital governance capacity, and improve other aspects.

3. China boosts construction of national computing hubs

China has approved projects to build eight national computing hubs and approved plans on 10 national-data center clusters, indicating the completion of the overall layout for the national integrated big-data center system.

The projects were approved by the National Development and Reform Commission and three other central departments, indicating a strategy is in full swing to channel more computing resources from the eastern areas to the less developed western regions.

4. China's local governments double down on innovation to drive growth

China's local governments have vowed to further develop future industries, from metaverse and blockchain to artificial intelligence and extended reality, a move reflective of their growing desire to look to innovation as a key driver of growth.

Nurturing "specialized and innovative" small and medium-sized enterprises has been high on the agenda of the industrial policies of many local governments.

5. China's anti-pandemic policy has limited impact on economy: report

China's anti-pandemic approach of clearing COVID-19 infections in a timely manner has limited drag on the economy, Bloomberg said Tuesday, citing a report by Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Limited, which referred to the approach as a "COVID-zero" policy.

Only some 2.6 percent of China's economy in terms of gross domestic product are affected by the "dynamic clearing" policy measures, according to the report.

6. BRI helps fill development gap left by West

The Belt and Road Initiative is meeting "tremendous needs" for infrastructure in Africa and other places in the world, while the United States and European countries have been unwilling to do so, said US-based experts, calling on the West to boost investments.

Critics of the BRI have raised concerns about the potential impact on host countries, but Jennifer Hillman, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, said people should understand the context that China is "filling a tremendous need out there in the world, a need that we and others had not been willing or able to fill".

7. President lauds 65 years of diplomatic ties with Sri Lanka

President Xi Jinping praised China and Sri Lanka on Thursday for setting an example of friendly coexistence and mutually beneficial cooperation between countries different in size, and he called for steady progress in the future development of bilateral ties.

8. G20 finance leaders to debate inflation, fallout from tighter policy

Finance leaders of the world's top 20 economies will debate the fallout from lingering geopolitical tensions, rising global inflation and tighter monetary policy in some regions at a two-day meeting kicking off on Thursday. 

9. Xi, Macron pledge deeper cooperation, closer China-EU ties

Chinese President Xi Jinping and his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, on Wednesday agreed in a telephone conversation to deepen cooperation between China and France, as well as to advance China-European Union (EU) relations.

The talk marked the eighth phone conversation between the two heads of state since the COVID-19 pandemic broke out, and also an important exchange between the two presidents since France took over the rotating presidency of the Council of the EU. The phone call also took place in the first month of the Year of the Tiger and coincided with the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics.

The "New Year" call between the Chinese and French leaders is of great significance, which steers the relations between the two countries and China-EU relations, experts say.

10. Putin: Russia 'ready to work' with West on de-escalating tensions over Ukraine

Russian President Vladimir Putin told visiting German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in Moscow on Tuesday that he is "ready to work" with the West on de-escalating tensions, the latest signal that the prospect of war with Ukraine could be receding.

Putin said at a news conference following his meeting with Scholz that Russia does not want war, and that is why it submitted proposals on security guarantees in Europe and hopes that their key points will be taken into account during negotiations.

Editor: Li Qiaoqiao