The CPC Central Committee and the State Council have recently issued the Opinions on Accelerating the Comprehensive Green Transformation of Economic and Social Development, which marks the first systematic deployment of comprehensive green transformation at the central government level. In this regard, Professor Xie Xuemei and doctoral student Han Yuhang from the Department of Innovation and Strategy (under preparation) of Tongji SEM have published an article in Jiefang Daily and Shanghai Observer, holding that improving the green manufacturing system is a focus in the development of new quality productive forces and can be supported from dimensions of systems, factors, funding, institutions, and entities. The published original text is as follows.

Firstly, green, low-carbon, and high-quality development is an inherent feature of new quality productive forces.

New quality productive forces feature green practices, high-tech innovations, energy efficiency, and high quality. Accelerating the development of these forces fundamentally transforms the extensive mode of traditional productive forces characterized by high input, high consumption, high pollution, and low efficiency into an ecology-prioritized path of green development.

The core concept of green productive forces involves raising new and higher standards for workers, means of labor, and subjects of labor, through the improvement and optimal combination of these elements, all based on green total factor productive forces. Therefore, vigorously developing new quality productive forces requires not only the cultivation of skilled workers with technical expertise and environmental awareness but also the introduction of more low-carbon, green, eco-friendly, and sustainable material and non-material resources. This way, through the combined efforts of workers and means of labor, the complete transformation and creation of new labor subjects in the field of green development can be accomplished, ultimately leading to the realization of green value-added outcomes.

Secondly, the development of new quality productive forces is inseparable from the carrier support provided by the green manufacturing system.

It is proposed in the Opinions on Accelerating the Comprehensive Green Transformation of Economic and Social Development that green manufacturing and service systems should be built and the proportion of green and low-carbon industries in the economy should be continuously increased. The green manufacturing system mainly covers green factories, green supply chain management enterprises, and green parks, all of which serve as key platforms for cultivating and developing new quality productive forces.

Green factories, as the core units of China’s green manufacturing system, adopt low-carbon energy-saving technologies and new production materials to achieve greater economic and environmental benefits by reducing pollution emissions and improving energy efficiency.

Green supply chain management enterprises are key hubs within China’s green manufacturing system. They place more emphasis on coordinated green and low-carbon development with upstream and downstream enterprises, compared to relatively independent green factory enterprises.

Green parks are carriers for implementing the comprehensive industrial layout in China’s green manufacturing system. Green parks also serve as comprehensive platforms of new quality productive forces at the regional level. They help attract more investments in environmental protection, green subsidies, and ESG funds. Additionally, green parks provide an external environment that encourages cooperation in green innovation. This not only attracts high-tech, high-value-added, and environmentally sustainable enterprises, enhancing the competitiveness of green enterprises within the parks, but also offers good development opportunities to these enterprises. Furthermore, green parks play a key role in attracting and retaining top-tier technical talents, thereby boosting the development of new quality productive forces at both the industrial and regional levels.

Thirdly, the development of new quality productive forces necessitates further improvement of China’s green manufacturing system.

Some measures can be taken to further improve the system, including:

(1) Promoting the balanced development of green manufacturing systems at all levels to provide systemic support for developing new quality productive forces;

(2) Deepening the coordination of digitalization and green development to provide the necessary resources for advancing new quality productive forces;

(3) Improving green credit, green finance, and digital finance to provide financial support for developing new quality productive forces;

(4) Strengthening the voluntary disclosure mechanisms in the green manufacturing system to provide institutional support for developing new quality productive forces; and

(5) Exploring the “industry-university-research-finance-intermediary” cooperation model in green manufacturing to provide entity support for developing new quality productive forces.