China stands firm in opening wider to the outside world and fulfilling its various international commitments. Over the past decades, foreign enterprises, including US businesses, have not only been deeply involved in China's economic and social development, but are also expected to play a more active and crucial role in China's pursuit of fuller modernization.

As it is the world's second-largest economy and is still growing at an annual pace of more than 5 percent, China is hoping that its modernization drive will create important opportunities for foreign businesses, including those from the United States, to develop both in China and globally.

China's modernization drive will inevitably depend on global resources and capabilities. Meeting the demand of a major market like China, which is undergoing technological upgrading and has a huge population of 1.4 billion, will certainly place higher requirements on suppliers, and they will need to continually improve efficiency and reduce costs. Nevertheless, once US businesses manage to maintain steady participation in the course of Chinese modernization, they will be rewarded with long-term stable market support, and pressure on them finding new markets will be significantly reduced.

China's modernization is one of common prosperity for all. The concept of common prosperity for all that China is pursuing, instead of compromising the interests of some other countries or groups, involves a more rational and sustainable development pattern that provides large development space where all market players can make the best of their strengths to earn dividends. By participating in China's modernization process, US firms can also get a clearer picture of the local investment environment to facilitate better business strategies.

China's modernization drive is based on material, cultural and ethical advancements. Improving the material well-being of market players is an important goal of China's economic policymakers. Apart from a higher capacity to produce goods, improvements in the efficiency of logistics, transportation, and wholesale and retail systems are also important factors. For a long time, the US culture of exploration and innovation has played a positive role in inspiring commercial success, especially in terms of business innovation, in Chinese society. The exchanges between East and West have also created more opportunities for US companies to develop their role as a bridge between the two countries.

As China pursues modernization, it is essential to reduce irreversible damage to the environment by reducing the activities of energy-intensive and high-emission industries. This requires adjusting market expectations and economic and social development patterns, and policymakers must be careful not to take shortcuts.

Since the US got an early start in terms of industrialization and modernization, US enterprises have richer experience in dealing with the impact of economic activity on the environment. They have developed and applied several technologies and product innovations to cope with and reduce environmental impact. As China is committed to achieving carbon peak and emission reduction goals, its development mindset contained in its modernization philosophy can provide a lot of space for such innovations by foreign firms, including US businesses.

As it is a major global player committed to high-standard opening-up, China's modernization process is extensively and deeply interconnected with the outside world.

For China, its development is neither intended to take away development space from other countries, nor is it targeted at replicating and imposing its own development philosophy and model on others. Instead, it is based on reciprocal cooperation and the principle of achieving shared growth through consultation and collaboration.

It is precisely this concept of Chinese modernization that contributes to reducing the negative impact of economic globalization and provides support for all parties to gain from China's development. As a result, US firms are also expected to benefit from it as China's growth is set to provide more development opportunities for their growth.

US companies were among the first foreign investors to enter the Chinese market some decades ago. Therefore, they enjoy some advantages, such as higher levels of familiarity with the local market environment. To fully benefit from these advantages and seek win-win and coordinated development, it is advisable for US businesses to participate in China's economic activities in a more active manner.

US firms in China should respect the basic principle of equality, mutual benefit, transparency and openness, which are the basic conditions for current cooperation-based global economic and trade interactions. They should reduce any differentiated development mentality resulting from trade protectionism — for example, an "America First" policy — respect the basic rights and claims of developing countries and, on this basis, seek to establish more friendly economic and trade ties with local players.

China's socialist market-oriented economy, on which its modernization drive is built, means the market plays a fundamental role in resource allocation. US businesses are encouraged to give feedback about their business development requirements through various channels, so as to build a more constructive, convenient and safe business environment for them, which will also promote cross-border two-way flows of capital and data, and improve China's ability to support the development of multinationals and meet their operational needs.

In the face of the current economic and trade frictions and protectionism on a global scale, Chinese and US businesses should further enhance mutual trust, and engage in a more effective and flexible mode of cooperation and collaboration to build global value, industrial and supply chains. US firms should leverage China's manufacturing and services prowess to reduce the impact of supply chain fluctuations, improve supply chain resilience and further enhance their competitive edge amid global competition.

US enterprises can play a crucial role in the promotion of the Belt and Road Initiative, and benefit from new development needs generated by such expansion of economic and trade activities by participating in BRI-related cooperative projects on supply chains, capital, personnel and corporate governance.

China highly values security amid development as it pursues modernization. US businesses can turn their competitive advantages into concrete market moves to help Chinese regulators improve risk prevention and response, and support China in its ongoing efforts to improve its risk prevention system and enhance the resiliency of its market, industries and enterprises.

By Zhou Mi, a researcher with the Institute of American and Oceanian Studies of the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation, the Ministry of Commerce