Investment in Guizhou is just in time: Deepening East-West Cooperation, Linking Inland China to Over

Guizhou welcomes you. The conference of Deepening East-West Collaboration for Investment Invitation, a major event of 2019 Cross-Border Investment and Trade Fair, Guizhou Inland Opening-Up Pilot Economic Zone, China has recently been held in Guiyang City. Representatives from China's ministries and commissions, counterpart cities in eastern China, overseas institutions and enterprises, excellent enterprises at home and abroad, and nine cities (autonomous prefectures) of Guizhou Province, as well as foreign envoys and experts have attended the conference to discuss how to build a new pattern of mutual aid between east and west in China and linkages between inland and overseas in opening up to the outside world. They have also talked about the construction of benefit-sharing platform of "East-West partnership in attracting investment".   

In 1996, the central government made a major decision on "poverty alleviation through cooperation between the east and the west". Since then, Shanghai and Zunyi, Dalian and Liupanshui, Qingdao and Anshun, Shenzhen and Bijie, Suzhou and Tongren, Hangzhou and southeastern Guizhou, Guangzhou and southern Guizhou, Ningbo and southwestern Guizhou have joined hands in supporting activities in project cooperation, industrial development, talent exchange and so on. 

The cooperation of poverty alleviation between the east and the west is an important strategic plan to speed up the development of the poor areas in the west China. It shall narrow the gap between the east and the west, and promote the coordinated development of regional economy. Since 2019, 455 projects have been invested in Guizhou by eight partner cities, including Shanghai, Shenzhen, Guangzhou, Hangzhou, Dalian, Ningbo, Qingdao and Suzhou, with a contract investment of 134.95 billion yuan. In Guizhou Province, 18.9% of the funds come from the aids of partner cities. 

In his speech at the conference, Lu Yongzheng, deputy Governor of Guizhou Province has mentioned that Guizhou is the main battlefield for the country to overcome poverty. With the help of the partner cities in the east, Guizhou's economic growth has ranked the top three in the country for eight and a half consecutive years. In 2018, the total regional GDP of the province has reached 1.48 trillion yuan, 2388 times that of 1949. Since the 18th National Congress of the CPC, the number of poverty-stricken people has been reduced from 9.23 million to 1.55 million, ranking the top in the country. The occurrence of poverty has decreased from 26.8% to 4.3%. The achievement in poverty alleviation has been praised by General Secretary Xi Jinping as an epitome of the great strides made by the Party and the state since the 18th National Congress.

Lu said that Guizhou's location advantages are becoming increasingly prominent. The development channels are fully open. The industrial investment potential is huge. The open platform is full of vitality and the business environment is fully optimized. At present, Guizhou has a strong momentum of development, good ecological environment, convenient transportation, superior business environment. Various new industries, new formats and new modes of business are flourishing. It is just in time to invest in Guizhou.

"Green is the background color of Guizhou, and ecology is the wealth of Guizhou." Lu Yongzheng invited to the guests to invest in the "new world" of Guizhou's rural economy and Guizhou's green agriculture, helping products of Guizhou to be accepted by the world.

Yang Dong, deputy director of The State Council Leading Group Office of Poverty Alleviation and Development, said in his speech that Guizhou has kept overcoming poverty with great efforts. Guizhou has been in the leading position in the national assessment of the effectiveness of poverty alleviation for three consecutive years. It has written the "Guizhou chapter" in China's poverty alleviation miracle with practical actions. Meanwhile, , Shanghai, Dalian, Suzhou, Hangzhou, Ningbo, Qingdao, Guangzhou and other eastern provinces and cities have always supported Guizhou with funds and utmost sincerity. With the joint efforts of all of us, Guizhou today is tearing off the label of poverty and backwardness, handing out its colorful and beautiful business cards.

Yang Dong expressed his expectation for the participants to pay more attention to Guizhou's development and to support Guizhou's of poverty alleviation. He encouraged the participants to put more investment in Guizhou and to start more businesses as well. He called on the participants to take practical actions to help Guizhou win the battle of poverty alleviation, becoming a well-off province in an all-round way along with the whole country.

Jiang Laiqing, vice mayor of Suzhou, as one of the seven partners of Guizhou, introduced the industrial cooperation between Suzhou and Tongren on how to guide enterprises to enter copper industries and on strengthening the construction of joint-construction parks. He shared the industrial cooperation between Suzhou and Tongren to push forward poverty alleviation through consumption. He also talked about the two-way flow of tourism resources in Suzhou and Tongren and the cultural tourism cooperation.

Upon the reference of the "Model of Suzhou and Chuzhou ", Suzhou has made innovations in the construction of Tongren Co-construction Park. At present, 15 industrial and agricultural industrial parks have been built in Suzhou and Tongren. Tongren has established a 10632.5 mu direct supply base of green agricultural products for Eastern cities, reaching, benefiting 11546 poverty-stricken people. Jiang Laiqing said that Suzhou will, as always, help Tongren's fight against poverty.

In his speech, Wan Yang, Assistant Representative of the United Nations Development Programme in China, said that in the past 40 years of China's reform and development, great achievements have been made in poverty alleviation. More than 700 million people have been got out of poverty. From 1990 to 2015, 70% of the world's contribution to poverty eradication came from China in the implementation of the United Nations Millennium Goals. According to China's plan, China will eradicate absolute poverty by 2020, which means that China will complete the goal of poverty eradication of the United Nations 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda 10 years ahead of schedule.

Wan Yang said that it is great that Guizhou can seize the historical opportunity to develop the big data industry. As a national pilot zone of inland opening-up, Guizhou shall grasp the chance and plan revolutionary development. Also, he suggested that while introducing the project, Guizhou shall also focus on using high-end platforms to create a good business environment and attract the project to come on its own initiative.

He said that the United Nations Development Programme and the Guizhou provincial government are working together to establish a mechanism cooperation platform of the United Nations Development Programme in Guizhou, pooling resources to help Guizhou achieve leap-forward development and enhance its internationalization. It is also in accordance with the inland opening-up pilot zone plan.

The first half of the meeting was chaired by Ma Lei, Director of Investment Promotion Bureau of Guizhou Province. Ma Lei said that a grand "Conference on Deepening East-West Collaboration for Investment Invitation" has been held in Guiyang City of Guizhou Province. Through the conference, we can see that in recent years, to meet the development needs of the east and the west, the eastern coastal cities have carried out a large number of industrial cooperation to assist Guizhou with focus laid on poverty alleviation. Through industrial cooperation, we have reached development consensus and achieved industrial connectivity. The governments have built up sound cooperation between departments. The enterprises have strengthened their mutual ties. Guizhou and its partners have realized the intercommunication of industries and the two-way flow of financing. We have transformed our resources and willingness to specific arrangements and working steps for investing and supporting industries, creating a new pattern of mutual aid between Guizhou and the eastern coastal areas, linkage between mainland and overseas, and opening up to the outside world, and setting up a meeting platform for east-west cooperation in attracting investment. As a result, the meeting was strongly supported by eastern cities and related enterprises, business associations and institutional organizations. Guizhou Provincial Party Committee and Government attach great importance to East-West cooperation, especially finding a platform and window for investment attraction and enterprises docking.

Representatives of enterprises and relevant experts and scholars all have addressed in the conference. Wan Junhua, chairman of Guangzhou Yuewang Agricultural Group introduced that the investment of Yuewang Group in Guizhou has been made in six regions, including Qiannan Prefecture, Southwest Guizhou Prefecture, Southeast Guizhou Prefecture, Anshun, Bijie and Liupanshui. The Group Company has set up six edible fungi planting bases, five vegetable planting bases and two organic fertilizer plants for recycling agricultural waste and a research and development plant of edible fungi and deep processing. The total investment has amounted to 800 million yuan. The cooperation between the east and west has helped the local people in Guizhou get rid of poverty and become rich. It has also established a reputation for Yuewang Group, and achieved real partner assistance.

She Chuhong, Vice President of Liby Group, shared how Liby Group helped to upgrade the health industry in Guizhou. As the leading enterprise in China's chemical industry, Liby Group has the honor to take over of state-owned equity, leading the construction in Guangzhou International Pharmaceutical Port in 2016. And it has formally entered the "Big Health" industry ever since. Guizhou, known as the "treasure house of natural medicines", is one of the four places of production of Chinese traditional medicines.

She Chuhong said that Guangzhou International Pharmaceutical Port is based on Guangzhou, connecting Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macao and the world's supermarkets. It is a good platform to help Guizhou to become "a strong province of traditional Chinese medicine", creating a good platform for “Guizhou selling its goods to the world”. It can provide a stable sales channel for genuine medicinal materials and agricultural products in Guizhou, supporting Guizhou to transform and upgrade its large health industry. It may well help millions of farmers to find jobs and increase their incomes.

Li Tie, former director of the National Development and Reform Commission's Center for Urban and Small Town Reform and Development, an expert on special allowances of the State Council, made a keynote speech at the conference entitled "How Guizhou can make use of its advantageous tourism resources to promote regional economic development under the cooperation between the east and the west". Through the analysis of Guizhou's advantageous industries, the speech explores how to promote Guizhou's economic development through tourism resources

Li Tie believes that Guizhou's advantages come from its good ecological environment, the changes in consumption structure brought about by China's economic growth, and the improvement of road traffic. It has great potential. But there are also shortcomings, such as long transportation communications, time consuming sightseeing tours, high number of tourists with low consumption level and weak financial supply capacity. He said that the short board may seem to be a problem at the moment, yet it is an opportunity for Guizhou to develop that can be compensated by attracting investment.

Cao Yuanzheng, a famous economist and member of the China Economic 50 Forum has addressed a keynote speech entitled "New Stage of China's Economic Development and New Opportunities for Guizhou's Economic Development", emphasizing that Guizhou is a new investment engine. It is time to invest in Guizhou. He said that the development of Guizhou's industry, the increase of residents' income and the improvement of transportation infrastructure have brought more advantages to Guizhou's location. Guizhou County expressway, if added with logistics and industry, can not only help Guizhou's products to go out, but also allowing Guizhou to serve as a transportation hub for the convenient logistics of "the belt and road".

Zunyi City, Bijie City and Qiannan Prefecture respectively recommended industrial cooperation projects at the meeting. Liu Chengdong, Vice Mayor of Zunyi Municipal People's Government, said that since 2017, 66 investment projects in Zunyi have been invested by Shanghai's investment enterprises, with a total investment of more than 26 billion yuan and an in-place capital of more than 18 billion yuan, which has helped Zunyi to lift itself out of poverty. At present, Zunyi, as a famous red culture city, a green industrial city and a city of golden hope, is the favorable place to undertake industrial transfer. All sectors of the world are welcome to invest in Zunyi. 

Deng Lin, Standing Committee of Nayong County Committee of Bijie City and Deputy Executive Director of the County Committee, introduced that Bijie is livable city and suitable for business. It owns reputation of leading producers of five businesses, namely, southwest coal, eco-tea, dancing of Miao, and dove trees. It seeks industrial partners in the industries of local chicken, edible fungi, radish, tea, beef cattle and fruit.

Deng Lin, Standing Committee of Nayong County Committee of Bijie City and Deputy Executive Director of the County Committee, introduced that Bijie is livable city and suitable for business. It owns reputation of leading producers of five businesses, namely, southwest coal, eco-tea, dancing of Miao, and dove trees. It seeks industrial partners in the industries of local chicken, edible fungi, radish, tea, beef cattle and fruit.

At the conference, 14 cooperation projects between the east and west industries have been signed, with a contract investment of 6.94 billion yuan, including Danzhai Wanda Town Hot Spring Hotel invested by Dalian Wanda Group, Guiding County Pig Eco-environmental Protection Breeding invested by Guangdong Haida Group, Bozhou District invested by Shanghai East Hope Group with an annual output of 3.2 million tons of alumina, and Hangzhou Wanse City Holdings invested in Majiang Intelligent Eco-bee Industry and the integration of three industries.

At the conference, the assisted municipalities and prefectures invite their partner city government leaders and heads of economic cooperation departments and representatives of relevant enterprises to hold docking meetings for face-to-face communication and targeted docking.