Qingdao West Coast New Area to boost high-quality development

Region focuses on industries, talent and marine economy

Since its establishment in 2014, the Qingdao West Coast New Area in Shandong province has made remarkable efforts to boost high-quality development, including in economic and industrial growth, marine economy and technological innovation, according to local officials.

Last year, the area's GDP reached 351.7 billion yuan ($51.42 billion), up 10.9 percent year-on-year, with the revenue of public budget hitting 26.27 billion yuan, up 10.5 percent year-on-year.

The industrial structure of the area had been optimized further, with the annual growth rate of the value for emerging industries achieving 20 percent.

The proportion of the tertiary industry to GDP increased 53 percent. The area ranked in the top three among 19 national-level new zones in terms of overall comprehensive strength.

To date, it has introduced more than 1,470 industrial projects with total investment of 1.27 trillion yuan.

The number of the accumulated investment projects initiated by the Fortune Global 500 companies recorded 226 with foreign capital surpassing $9 billion. There are now 260,000 market entities.

Focusing on the new and old kinetic energy conversion, the area has built six industrial bases in sectors including circular economy and intelligent manufacturing as well as 14 centers on international cooperation and communication and real economy. It is home to the world's largest intelligent manufacturing center of the Haier Duo Washing Machine, the smart factory of the Doublestar Tire and the industrial base of Shanghai General Motors Wuling.

The area has tried to build its own brands and set up a merit list covering secondary and service industries as well as agriculture.

Six brands in the area are among the list of the top 500 Chinese brands.

Wang Jianxiang, Party secretary of the Qingdao West Coast New Area, said the area has introduced a series of favorable policies to support the development of private enterprises.

A total of 15 companies including Qingdao Hiron Commercial Cold Chain and Qingdao Huicheng Environmental Technology have been successfully listed on the stock market.

The area is also aiming to promote the development of both traditional and emerging marine industries.

Total output value of the area's marine industry has increased from 49.1 billion to 118.2 billion yuan, with an annual increase of 19 percent. In 2018, the port throughput and container throughput of the area ranked seventh and eighth globally, with the completion of Aisa's first automatic container wharf in Qianwan port, a world-leading 400,000-metirc-ton ore wharf in Dongjiakou Port and China's largest 300,000-ton crude oil terminal.

It is home to a batch of national-level marine research institutions such as a research center under the Institute of Oceanology at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Wang added the area has achieved fruitful results in technological innovations.

It is home to 165 municipal-level and above key labs and national engineering research centers, 563 high-tech enterprises and 24 national-level incubators.

The area has introduced a total of 16 colleges together with 11 projects by renowned universities including Tsinghua University and University of Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Pushing forward 20 new polices to attract professionals around the world, the area has established recruitment and business centers and set up many overseas recruitment workstations in countries such as the United States and Germany.

The number of talented people in the area is 530,000, among whom 53 are academicians of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Chinese Academy of Engineering. The Qingdao West Coast New Area is striving to accelerate the economic development in rural areas and lift more people out of poverty by building modern agricultural demonstration zones, cultural tourism resorts and beautiful villages. It has built 12 towns with a good living environment and local characteristics as well as 43 demonstration villages featuring natural beauty and cultural creativity.