The central city-metropolitan area-urban agglomeration will be the main region driving China's socio-economic development in the future, the 21st Century Business Herald reported on Tuesday.

Based on such dimensions as economic expansion, industrial expansion, equitable delivery of public service, population expansion and transportation facilitation, the 21st Century Economic Research Institute jointly with the research institute under China Fortune Land Development assessed and ranked 30 metropolitan areas on economy driving capacity.

Beijing and Shanghai took the first and second spots in the metropolitan area ranking, followed by Shenzhen and Guangzhou.

The report said the relatively mature metropolitan areas have been formed around the four central cities.

These central cities have developed economy, industrial agglomeration, cost of living is relatively high, as well as people and industries are spreading to the surrounding area, and the city boundary has broken through administrative district apparently.

Moreover, Hangzhou, Nanjing, Chengdu, Wuhan, Zhengzhou, Changsha, Chongqing and Xi'an are following the first-tire cities to present the trend of external expansion on space and industries.

Currently, China has 28 cities with the urban population surpassing 3 million, and 45 cities' GDP exceeds 500 billion yuan.

In 2019, China's urbanization rate for the permanent resident population broke through 60 percent mark for the first time, meaning the country's urbanization process will turn to pursuit of high-quality from speed, plus central cities should disperse and transfer functions and industries to drive and support the surrounding cities and improve competitive power of the regional industrial clusters, said the 21st Century Business Herald, citing Ye Tanglin, executive deputy director of the Academy of Metropolis Economic and Social Development at Capital University of Economics and Business.

This year's Government Work Report emphasized that not only urbanization, including the central cities and urban agglomeration, should play a leading role at cultivating industries and creating jobs, but also expanding investments together with new infrastructure and major projects to boost consumption, benefit the people, facilitate structural adjustments and enhance the sustainability of growth.