Major policy announcement! The marine economy surpasses 11 trillion yuan, ushering in a golden age f

Recently, the journal 《Qiushi》 published an important article, "Promoting High-Quality Development of the Marine Economy," outlining the core path for my country's marine economic development. Simultaneously, the Ministry of Natural Resources released the "2025 China Marine Economy Statistical Bulletin," showing that in 2025, the national marine GDP reached 11.018 trillion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 5.5%, accounting for 7.9% of GDP, officially exceeding the 11 trillion yuan mark (Ministry of Natural Resources). Driven by both policy support and industrial breakthroughs, marine oil and gas extraction, a core area of ​​the marine economy, is ushering in new development opportunities and becoming a key engine for marine economic growth.

Strategic Setting: Six Core Directions for Marine Economic Development

"Promoting High-Quality Development of the Marine Economy" clarifies the overall approach and six key tasks for marine economic development, laying a solid foundation for top-level design in industrial development.

Core Approach: Adhering to innovation-driven development, efficient collaboration, industrial upgrading, harmony between humanity and the sea, and win-win cooperation, promoting high-level self-reliance in marine science and technology, and building a modern marine industrial system.

Six Key Tasks:

Strengthen top-level design and policy support, formulate the "15th Five-Year Plan" for marine economic development, guide social capital participation, and improve the fiscal and financial support system.

Enhance independent innovation in marine science and technology, cultivate leading marine science and technology enterprises and specialized and innovative SMEs, and break through bottlenecks in key core technologies.

Strengthen, optimize, and expand the marine industry, promote the transformation and upgrading of traditional marine industries, and expand emerging industries such as marine biomedicine and offshore wind power.

Coordinate the planning of major bays, promote the green and digital transformation of coastal port clusters, and optimize spatial layout (Hunan Provincial Government);

Strengthen marine ecological environment protection, promote comprehensive governance of key sea areas, explore marine carbon sequestration accounting, and achieve harmonious development between humans and the sea;

Deeply participate in global ocean governance, deepen international cooperation in the blue economy, and safeguard maritime rights and ecological security.

Scale Leap: 11 Trillion Yuan "Blue Engine" with Surging Momentum

The 11 trillion yuan scale of the marine economy by 2025 marks my country's marine economy officially entering a new stage of high-quality development, with continuous optimization of the industrial structure and significantly enhanced development resilience.

From an industrial structure perspective, marine services accounted for 58.3% of the economy, with an added value of 6.424 trillion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 5.1%, continuing to play a leading role. The added value of the secondary marine industry reached 4.1017 trillion yuan, an increase of 6.8%, with marine engineering equipment manufacturing growing by 10.2% and shipbuilding by 25.1%. The three core indicators hold over 50% of the international market share, maintaining China's leading position globally.

From a growth perspective, the added value of emerging marine industries increased by 7.3%, becoming a core driver of industrial upgrading. Traditional industries are accelerating their green and intelligent transformation, and the supply capacity of marine oil and gas resources continues to strengthen. In 2025, marine crude oil and natural gas production increased by 3.4% and 17.0% year-on-year, respectively, with marine crude oil production accounting for nearly 70% of the total increase in national crude oil production, becoming an important support for energy security.

Key Breakthrough: Marine Oil and Gas Exploration Ushers in Double Benefits of Policy and Technology

As a core pillar industry of the marine economy, marine oil and gas exploration is ushering in a golden window of development, supported by strategic deployment, policy, and technological innovation.

Policy dividends continue to be released: In February 2026, the Ministry of Finance, the General Administration of Customs, and the State Taxation Administration jointly issued a policy clarifying that during the 15th Five-Year Plan period, import duties on equipment and instruments related to offshore oil and gas exploration and development would be exempted, reducing equipment investment costs for enterprises and improving exploration and development efficiency. Simultaneously, the Energy Law established a strategy of "equal emphasis on land and sea, increasing reserves and production," and the new Mineral Resources Law promoted the reform of the "integrated exploration and extraction" system, simplifying procedures and incentivizing enterprises to increase investment.

Profligate exploration results are fruitful: my country has achieved successive major breakthroughs in the Bohai Sea and the South China Sea, discovering oilfields with reserves exceeding 100 million tons, such as Huizhou 19-6 and Qinhuangdao 29-6, as well as several large gas fields with reserves exceeding 100 billion cubic meters (according to the Ministry of Natural Resources). The commissioning of major projects such as the first phase of the Bozhong 26-6 oilfield and the second phase of the "Deep Sea One" project further solidified the resource reserve base and promoted the expansion of offshore oil and gas exploitation into deep-water and deep-layer areas.

Technological innovation drives upgrades: Key technologies for deep-sea oil and gas exploration and development continue to break through, with national heavyweights such as "Deep Sea No. 1" achieving independent operation, and marine oil and gas extraction gradually transforming towards digitalization and intelligence. The advancement of three-dimensional stratified utilization technology in marine areas enables efficient development of marine resources, providing technological support for the sustainable development of the industry (Ministry of Natural Resources).

Future Outlook: Building a New Ecosystem for the Marine Oil and Gas Industry

With the deepening of the high-quality development strategy for the marine economy, marine oil and gas extraction will usher in three major development trends, becoming a core growth point for the marine economy.

First, the increase in reserves and production will continue to deepen, focusing on key sea areas such as the Bohai Sea and the South China Sea, promoting deep-water exploration and efficiency enhancement of old oilfields, further increasing the proportion of marine oil and gas production, and strengthening the national energy security barrier.

Second, technological innovation will accelerate its iteration, breaking through key technologies such as deep-water drilling and improved recovery rates, promoting the greening, intelligentization, and efficiency of marine oil and gas extraction.

Third, industrial integration will improve quality and efficiency, promoting the integrated development of "marine oil and gas + offshore wind power" and "marine oil and gas + marine carbon sinks," building a diversified and collaborative marine energy industry system.

A nation's prosperity depends on its maritime strength; a nation's strength depends on its maritime power. The 11 trillion yuan industry scale is a new starting point, not an end point. Guided by the important article "Promoting High-Quality Development of the Marine Economy," and relying on policy support and technological innovation, offshore oil and gas extraction will continue to unleash its development potential, injecting strong momentum into the high-quality development of the marine economy, and helping my country accelerate the construction of a maritime power and achieve its strategic goal of strengthening the nation through the sea.