A tourist takes a close look at the famous ancient painting "Along the River during Qingming Festival" on the dynamic high-definition large-screen in Chongqing, southwest China. (PHOTO: XINHUA)

By ZHONG Jianli

As the life service industry is an important area to promote consumption and improve people's livelihood, the Chinese authorities recently issued some guiding opinions on accelerating the digital empowerment of life services.

The opinions, aiming to promote the integration of the digital economyandreal economy, outline that by 2025, a preliminary "digital + life services" ecosystem will be established, showcasing a number of mature digital applications and developing new formats and models. By 2030, the digital infrastructure for life services is anticipated to be deeply integrated into people's lives, with richer digital application scenarios.

In recent years, with the widespread application of new-generation information technologies represented by big data, cloud computing and blockchain, new formats and models have continuously emerged in thelifeservice industry, indicating a clear trend of digital transformation and upgrading.

Nonetheless, there are still challenges such as uneven development of digitalization among industries, regions and the upstream and downstream of the industrial chains, as well as inadequate technical and talent support for digital transformation and upgrading.

In response, the opinions enumerate 19 specific tasks and measures focusing on enriching digital application scenarios, addressing shortcomings, and stimulating the momentum for digital development of life services.

They include further promoting digitalization in commercial and trade services, transportation, culture and tourism, education and healthcare.

The document also proposes strengthening the construction of digital infrastructure for life services, creating digital life service communities and neighborhoods, establishing standards for digital life services, and improving digital applications and services for the elderly and people with disabilities.

To lay a solid foundation for digital life services, the policy calls for bolstering forward-looking basic research, and enhancing the application of technologies such as the BeiDou satellite navigation system, 5G, cloud computing, big data, blockchain, AI, virtual reality and the Internet of Things in the life service industry.

In addition, the opinions proposeto strengthenfinancial support for digitalization,cultivatedigital professionals,improvethe digital management level, andenhancedata security protection and integrated application capabilities.