The digitalization of industries and government administration has become an important force to drive social and economic development in East China's Shandong province, local media reported.

Big data is one of the most important drivers of the digital economy and the fourth industrial revolution. [Photo/IC]

In recent years, Shandong has been promoting digitalization to inject new vitality into the province's high-quality development. According to Digital China Index Report (2020) and 2020 White Paper on China's Digital Government Construction, Shandong's digital index and digital government construction index are both ranked third in China.

The province has been promoting the construction of an online governmental affairs service platform which integrates cross-department and cross-regional data to provide convenient and efficient services to citizens.

"The number of registered users of the iShandong app, the general portal for mobile government services, has exceeded 70 million. All high-frequency services at the provincial and municipal levels can be handled via the app," said Gu Weidong, deputy director of the Shandong Provincial Big Data Bureau.

Shandong has also seized the development opportunity of the digital economy and cultivated a number of big data enterprises, and implemented an intelligent and green technological transformation project to enable the transformation and upgrading of the traditional manufacturing industry.

The province has identified 115 provincial industrial internet platforms, 232 smart agricultural application bases, and 1.71 million online retail stores.

In 2020, the total output of Shandong's digital economy exceeded 3 trillion yuan ($470.4 billion), becoming an important economic growth pole in the province.

Shandong has also accelerated the construction of digital infrastructure to provide support for economic and social development. Up to now, Shandong has built and opened more than 100,000 5G base stations. It has also built 204 data centers of various types.