China's major provincial economic powerhouses are an important window to observe the Chinese economy. If China's economy is a great ship powering through the waves, then its major provincial economic powerhouses are the ballast that keeps it steady and the engine that pushes it forward.

Given the wide disparities in resource endowments and development foundations across regions, China's realities call for a holistic approach, one that balances key areas with the bigger picture. Whether these economic powerhouses hold firm will directly determine whether the giant ship of China's economy can sail steadily ahead, said Zhou Yiren, director of the Institute of Spatial Planning and Regional Economy under the National Development and Reform Commission, on People's Daily's "Stories of High-Quality Development."

How do these economic powerhouses assume greater responsibility? The answer can be found in four vivid stories.

Independent breakthroughs accelerate development of industrial networks

The industrial internet serves as crucial infrastructure for the new type of industrialization. At Purple Mountain Laboratories in Nanjing, east China's Jiangsu Province, researchers are weaving a network that empowers machine tools to maximize equipment performance, enables intelligent management to enhance manufacturing productivity, and develops cloud platforms to support traditional businesses in their digital transformation.

Traditional industrial networks are plagued by unstable latency and poor compatibility among heterogeneous devices, leaving real-time control demands in sectors such as smart grids and rail transit simply out of reach. Tightly controlled foreign technologies compound the problem, driving equipment costs prohibitively high. "As a strategic technology innovation platform focused on building future networks, we assembled a specialized team to tackle these pain points," said Zhu Hailong, head of TSN Technology Team, Purple Mountain Laboratories.

"The path was fraught with challenges: the scheduling algorithms for Time-Sensitive Networking (TSN) controllers were extremely complex, with no ready or universal solutions; the lack of protocol uniformity across different manufacturers' devices led to repeated compatibility test failures. After conducting over 1,000 rounds of tests, we finally developed China's first controller to pass TSN industry chain directory testing, achieving nanosecond-level synchronization and microsecond-level jitter control," he added.

Yet, a technological breakthrough was just the first step. The ultimate goal was commercializing these achievements. Zhu's team pioneered a collaborative model incorporating labs, enterprises and capital, building joint testbeds with companies and deeply integrating TSN technology with industrial scenarios to develop commercial products such as TSN switches and gateways.

According to Zhou, Jiangsu's experience shows that "taking the lead" is not just a slogan. It means taking on the toughest challenges in core technologies, nurturing industries and, above all, pioneering reforms in systems and mechanisms — turning a "list of problems" into a "list of experiences."

Riding the waves: Foreign trade logistics reach all corners of the world

At Shenzhen-Shanwei Special Cooperation Zone's Xiaomo International Logistics Port, rows of new energy vehicles are lined up and ready for shipment. At the western area of Shenzhen Port, automated terminals operate with high efficiency, served by a dense network of international shipping routes. Together, they form a vibrant window showcasing the openness of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area.

According to Shenzhen Customs, in the first quarter of this year, Shenzhen's foreign trade volume reached 1.32 trillion yuan ($193 billion), up 33.6 percent year on year and accounting for 11.1 percent of the national total.

"I've been working here for 10 years. This used to be an ordinary residential community. No one expected it would gradually grow into an international logistics hub," said Li Jiahao, deputy secretary of the Party committee of Fuwei community, Fuyong subdistrict, Bao'an district, Shenzhen. This area was once home to just a few scattered small shops serving nearby communities. Now, nearly every household is involved in cross-border trade, shipping goods to over 200 countries and regions around the world.

"Over 20 years ago, we were mainly engaged in OEM exports. Now, most of our shipments carry our own brands. 'Made in China' has given way to smart manufacturing. Thanks to Shenzhen's logistics network and Guangdong's industrial advantages, our goods can reach global customers faster and more reliably. That's the real backbone of China's foreign trade," said Gan Sisi, vice president of E-commerce Logistics, Gotofreight Group.

According to Deng Wei, vice director of Foreign Trade Division, Commerce Bureau of Shenzhen Municipality, Shenzhen's sustained core strength in foreign trade draws on several sources: the resonance between an effective market and a well-functioning government; the deep circulation of technological innovation, agile manufacturing and global trade; and the integrated coordination of production, supply, sales, domestic and foreign trade, and upstream and downstream chains. Above all, it rests on the solid foundation of a world-class business environment that is market-oriented, law-based and internationalized.

From changes in orders to changes in industry, the resilience of Shenzhen's foreign trade reflects the strength of Guangdong as a major economic powerhouse. On the relationship between domestic and international economic cycles, Zhou said major provincial economic powerhouses must strengthen the domestic economic cycle, enhance their role as both a hub and a stabilizing backbone, and better connect domestic and global markets.

Intensive cultivation unlocks the potential of small seeds

In October 2024, a wheat variety named "Pubing 03" sold for 6.66 million yuan at the Central Plains Agricultural Valley in central China's Henan Province. Eight months later, its developer had signed contracts with 65 agents, covering 73 counties and districts nationwide, with a key market coverage rate of over 90 percent.

"Henan's wheat-growing area reaches 85 million mu (5.67 million hectares), making it the country's largest wheat-producing province. For seed innovation and breeding work, coming here was exactly the right call," said Zhang Jinpeng, Zhongyuan Research Center, Institute of Crop Sciences, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences. "We also refer to Pubing 03 as the 'lazy man's variety' because it's one that farmers can plant and walk away from."

Henan Province, with 6.25 percent of the nation's cultivated land, produces 25 percent of the country's wheat and 10 percent of its total grain, supplying 30 million tonnes of raw grain and processed products annually. As a major provincial economic powerhouse, Henan's role as an anchor is reflected not only in its output but also in the institutional and mechanism innovations it has developed to safeguard national food security.

At the Central Plains Agricultural Valley, the province has brought together 17 academicians, 69 innovation teams and more than 470 high-level seed industry professionals. It has built 67 research platforms at the provincial level or above and preserved 200,000 germplasm resources. More importantly, it has developed a "golden triangle" model in which enterprises raise questions, the government sets the agenda and scientists provide answers. The model helps top varieties like "Pubing 03" move swiftly from the laboratory to the field.

From a single seed to an industry, Henan, a major provincial economic powerhouse, shoulders significant responsibility, according to Chen Jianhong, deputy mayor of Xinxiang, Henan Province, executive deputy director of the Management Committee of Henan Zhongyuan Nonggu, and secretary of the Party Working Committee of Xinxiang Pingyuan Urban-Rural Integration Demonstration Zone. This responsibility comes not merely through scale but through the strategic resilience to "hold firm" in key areas and the institutional innovation to "find a way forward," Chen said. Food security is a matter of utmost national importance. With the commitment of the "Central Plains Granary," Henan has helped keep the nation's rice bowl firmly in hand, offering a vivid example of how a major provincial economic powerhouse can serve as a cornerstone of stability.

Advancing in synergy, making different regions reinforce each other in regional development

"Green beans picked this morning will be on dinner tables along the coast of Fujian tomorrow evening!" In the greenhouses of the Huihong Modern Facility Agriculture Industrial Park in Wuzhong, northwest China's Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, farmers are busy sorting and boxing their harvest, their faces beaming with joy.

This lively scene of production and sales is a vivid testament to 30 years of cooperation between southeast China's Fujian and Ningxia, spanning over 2,000 kilometers, leveraging the advantages of the east to drive development in the west.

As key areas receiving targeted assistance under the Fujian-Ningxia pairing assistance program, Hui'an county in Quanzhou city, Fujian, and Hongsibu district in Wuzhong city, Ningxia, have achieved a "two-way journey" of mutual support and cooperation. The Huihong Modern Facility Agriculture Industrial Park is a microcosm of this collaboration.

With a total investment of 112 million yuan, including approximately 13 million yuan from the Fujian-Ningxia pairing assistance program fund, the project has effectively leveraged private capital for its construction and operation, said Zhuang Zeping, deputy secretary of Party Committee of Hongsibu district. Since its completion, the park has generated over 8 million yuan in annual labor income for the local community and contributed more than 1.8 million yuan to the collective revenue of Yangliu village.

"There are more and more people in the village, and many young people are returning to start businesses or find employment," said Ma Zhirui, Party secretary of Yangliu village. He noted that more and more people from Ningxia have transformed from migrant workers into e-commerce livestreamers and entrepreneurs, as the collaboration between the two regions has cultivated more business opportunities in achieving mutual complementarity and win-win results.

Lin Liangzhen, head of the Rural Revitalization Counterpart Cooperation Division of the Fujian Provincial Department of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, explained that over the past 30 years, Fujian has provided more than 7 billion yuan in aid to Ningxia, implemented over 4,000 projects and established 12 Minning industrial parks.

"What emerges clearly is that for major provincial economic powerhouses, shouldering greater responsibility is never about going it alone or deepening regional imbalances. It is about giving better play to the driving role of key regions, handling the relationship between priorities and the whole with a systematic perspective, and using strengths in key regions to serve the overall interests of the country," Zhou explained.