Disparities of China’s regions development: dependence on the sectoral economic structure

The article explores the dynamics of changes in disparities of China’s regions’ economic level. According to a number of researchers, economic disparities between China’s regions started to decrease from about the mid-2000s. To clarify this picture the article uses indicator of contribution of the region’s GRP to the country’s total GRP. As a result of the research carried out by the author, it was found that in the PRC there really was a period when the economic gap between regions was narrowing down, but in general, changes in the relative contribution of regions to the country’s GRP are more complex than just a decrease or increase in economic disparities. Also, based on statistical data, the article draws conclusions about the relationship between the dynamics of the region’s contribution to the total GRP and the shares of the secondary and tertiary sectors in the region’s economy. It turned out that the increase in the economic level of the region in comparison with other regions is closely related to the share of the secondary sector in the GRP of this region: in most regions of China, the increase in the share of the secondary sector occurs in parallel with the growth of the contribution of the region’s GRP to the total GRP of the country. The growth in the share of the tertiary sector, on the contrary, in most cases is accompanied by a relative decrease in the economic level of the region, that is, its contribution to the total GRP decreases.