Full coverage: The Sixth Plenum of the 18th CPC Central Committee

The sixth plenum of Communist Party of China is taking place right now in Beijing...let's find out how much further we've come since the last plenum.
 
Coordination is one of the key principles in China's development plan for the next five years. Coordination has multi-layered meanings.

One of them is to balance the growth between different regions. Eastern China, central China and western China are not on the same page in terms of development levels. To put the picture on a smaller scale, development in Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei province are not at the same level. Now the situation may change, however. That's as a big data center has been unveiled in the city of Zhang Jiakou in Hebei.

Urban and Rural development coordination. This pair of relations involves a population of several hundred million people, as well as environment and natural resources issues. How to make development more inclusive, letting the pair grow at the same time, and reducing the differences between the two is key to making China a relatively wealthy country.

Economic and national defense coordination. Economic expansion should come with national security. And many technology advancements could be applied to both military and civilian use. The government wants to build both a wealthy and safe China, so to integrate the military and civilian development is a good way.

Two big data centers were established In Zhang Jiakou city last month. Tens of thousands of computers were connected to deal with data through internet-based services and cloud computing. The two mega-data projects cost 20 billion yuan and were built by Alibaba. The company said the investment answers its customers' needs.

"We have a number of clients in this area. They have very tough demands on data computing. We provide them with infrastructure, which stores their data. And they could use them to do what they need to." Alibaba chief technology officer Jeff Zhang said.

Officials say the move is in line with the requirements of the Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei integration. It also takes advantage of the local climate. Solar and wind power can generate enough electricity to support the data centers. Similar projects could follow suit.
 
"Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei province is a pioneer in big data industry. This year China has coordinated three ministries to work together on policy guidelines and industry planning." Ministry of Industry & Information Technology Gao Lin said.

There is much hope developing in the region. That's as the integration effort continues, the need for data will increase in many sectors, including transportation, the internet, and city management. Analysts hope the project will help build smart, green cities.