The digital creative industry has been included in China's strategic emerging industries plan, an expert said at the 14th international Service Trade Forum on Monday.

The country has added the industry to the national key industries field to increase its soft power, which can satisfy both material and spiritual needs as well as increase effective supply by designing at the source, said Jin Xu, president of the China Association of International Trade.

Moreover, the digital creative industry, including digital cultural creative equipments, digital cultural contents and design services, has important characteristics. It is high value-added, low energy consumption and low pollution, and also conforms to the positioning of strategic emerging industries, Jin added.

The digital creative industry is a new economic form that integrates modern information technologies and cultural and creative industries.

China will develop the digital creative industry with culture-led, advanced technology and a complete chain, and industry output value will reach 8 trillion yuan by 2020, according to the guideline on strategic emerging sectors in the 13th Five-Year Plan period.

At the forum, the latest report on the Development of China's International Cultural Trade was released, saying China's overall scale of cultural trade with foreign countries continues to grow steadily.

In 2019, China's import and export trade volume of cultural products totaled $111.45 billion , increasing 8.9 percent year-on-year, with exports and imports at $99.89 and $11.57 billion, up 8.9 and 7.9 percent year-on-year respectively, according to the data from the Ministry of Commerce.

The report said collectively and privately-owned enterprises have gradually become the main participators in the cultural export trade, the cultural products trade is mainly concentrated in developed countries and regions, and the scale of cultural products trade with countries and regions involved in the Belt and Road Initiative is increasing year-by-year.