Nation boosts community life circles

More cities to give residents easy access to goods, services within 15 minutes of home

China has heightened its efforts to provide city residents easy access to a variety of services within a 15-minute walk from home. It is expected to bolster and upgrade consumer buying while creating more jobs and improving the business environment, experts said.

The creation of what is called 15-minute community life circles is also meant to inject fresh impetus into the country's economic recovery, they said.

The circles aim to help residents meet their needs in daily life, work, study, travel, elder care and child care, among others.

At a recent news conference in Beijing, Minister of Commerce Wang Wentao said the country will roll out a three-year project to promote the establishment of more 15-minute community life circles nationwide.

The project also aims to enhance the layout of services and public facilities for residents in the circles while improving the digitalization and convenience of services and facilities, and is meant to adapt to different conditions in different places.

"We will try to motivate all big cities with suitable conditions in China to take moves to develop the 15-minute community life circles in various forms, to better meet people's daily needs," he said.

According to the Ministry of Commerce, 80 pilot cities in China have taken the initiative to develop community life circles since the ministry and several other departments jointly launched a campaign to promote the concept two years ago.

Approximately 1,402 such circles have been established, involving 280,000 commercial service sites that cover 2,766 communities and serve more than 32 million people, the ministry said.

"Some studies have shown that more than half of people's daily spending happens in an area around one kilometer from their communities or within a 15-minute walk from their homes, indicating consumer buying potential within the areas is huge," said Wang.

"Developing 15-minute community life circles means to accelerate the development of commerce around communities so that residents have high-quality and convenient services near their homes," he said. The measure is important to boost both consumer purchases and benefit residents, he added.

Zhou Mi, a senior researcher at the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation, said: "The establishment of such community life circles will efficiently meet residents' diversified consumption needs, which is of great significance amid consumption upgrades in China.

"Jobs are also created during the fulfillment of people's consumption demand, especially for people with certain skills or those who graduate from occupational schools."

Zhou said such convenience also brings with it improvements in the business environment.

Song Siyuan, a researcher at CAITEC, said the country's accelerated efforts in building community life circles demonstrate the government's concern for the people, and the development of the circles is expected to focus on meeting people's needs to help them pursue better lives.

Building the circles is linked to the country's development in digital technologies and services, she said.

"With application of digital technologies to improve the quality of commercial services around communities, the development of community life circles will promote the digital transformation of the services industry and promote deep integration between digital and real economies," Song said.

"That is to say, developing community life circles will effectively promote intelligent digital means in daily life and propel the growth of new digital consumption-based business formats and models, making great contributions to the construction of digital China," Song added.

In developing the 15-minute community life circles, the country will promote businesses that create more convenience for residents, such as chain and franchise convenience stores and eateries, high-quality food marketplaces and repair services, said Wang, the commerce minister.

The country will also enhance facilities for senior and child care in communities to provide better services, Wang said.