Urban Green Development Strategy in China

China’s urbanization has undergone a period of rapid expansion and quantitative growth. In 1978, China’s urbanization rate was only 17.9%, and it had reached 54.7% by 2014. The urbanization rate has increased by 36.9% points in the past 36 years, with an average annual increase rate of more than 1% point. At present, China has officially entered a city-oriented society. Along with the change of urban–rural dual structure, a large number of rural population flows to the city, providing adequate and cheap labor for urban development in China, bringing a huge “demographic dividend”, and strongly supporting the miracle of China’s economic growth. However, despite great achievements in economic and social development, China is still a developing country. China’s rapid urbanization has caused severe pressure on the environment. Due to excessive dependence on expanding the investment scale and increasing the material input, the limited natural supply capacity and carrying capacity of ecological environment have been weakened. The problem of disharmony among environment, economy and social development is becoming increasingly apparent, and the problem of uneven, uncoordinated and unsustainable development remains outstanding. “Urban diseases” such as environmental pollution, ecological damage, crowded population, traffic congestion, employment difficulties, housing shortage and polarization between the rich and the poor are becoming increasingly serious, and “rural diseases” such as economic contraction, population loss and cultural depression are also increasing. In the long run, promoting the quality, efficiency and sustainable green development of cities is not only the main direction of China’s urbanization process but also an important way to promote China’s economic and social development. Looking into the future, Chinese cities should adhere to the people-oriented development, realize the coordination and balance of relationship between man and nature, economy and society, government and market, and city and state, and build an urban green development system with livability, affluence, tolerance, good governance and strong state.