How will Chongqing become an international consumption center? On December 23, Opinions of the General Office of Chongqing Municipal People’s Government on Accelerating the Construction of International Consumption Center was issued on the official website of Chongqing Municipal People’s Government. According to this document, Chongqing will quicken the pace of becoming an international city of shopping, gourmet, exhibition, culture, and tourism.
Raffles City Chongqing
Renovating Guanyinqiao, Nanping and other business circles
The Opinions points out that, Chongqing will promote the planning, construction, and interconnection of central business districts such as Jiefangbei, Jiangbeizui, and Danzishi. It will comprehensively improve the architectural quality, urban landscape, and night lighting artistic effect, optimize supporting functions and commercial operation, speed up the resource aggregation and integration of international brands, high-end industries, etc., create landscape and art landmarks and build a core area for global consumption.
The city will also renovate pedestrian streets such as Jiefangbei, upgrade mature business circles such as Guanyinqiao, Nanping, Three Gorges Square and Yangjiaping and expand emerging business circles such as Daping, Jiazhou, Jinzhou and the bonded port, to create scene-based, intelligent, international and high-quality pedestrian streets and urban business circles.
International brands debuting in Chaotianmen and other places
While upgrading business circles, Chongqing will also try to be the first choice of international brands and expand the service of high-end consumption.
It includes introducing first stores, flagship stores, experience centers and chain stores of famous brands, encouraging famous high-end brands, designer brands, advanced customized brands, etc. to launch new products first in Chongqing; undertaking debut activities of international brands in Jiefangbei, Chaotianmen, etc.; supporting Global 500 companies to set up global headquarters in Chongqing.
To build itself into the global center of consumer products, Chongqing will also speed up the construction of the distribution center of import commodities, expand and strengthen the bonded commodity exhibition and trade center. The cross-border e-commerce smart cargo distribution center will be built with the support of a special controlled area of customs. The comprehensive cross-border e-commerce pilot zone and park will be constructed.
Encouraging university-enterprise cooperation on “Made in Chongqing” brands
The Opinions also mentions the development of “Boutique Products Made in Chongqing.”
To promote the inheritance and revitalization of time-honored brands, Chongqing will support the legacy and protection of traditional crafts, encourage enterprises to build teaching bases together with vocational institutions, and set up studios for skilled masters and intangible cultural heritage (ICH) inheritors. It will also support enterprises to improve traditional skills and operation performance with new technologies.
For the conservation of ICH, it is going to speed up the construction of ICH productive protection bases and develop brands and clusters of traditional craft industries such as stone carving and printmaking. It will encourage enterprises to declare municipal and national ICH actively.
More influence of hot pot and Xiao Mian as an “International City of Gourmet Food”
In terms of characteristic cultural tourism and catering consumption, the Opinions points out that Chongqing will create a batch of boutique cultural tourist scenic areas, tourism performances, and festivals. It plans to construct wharves for cruises and yachts in the Yangtze River, innovate the fast sightseeing boats of “water bus” and operate dedicated passenger lines and chartered flights for tourism. It will construct a cross-regional bus network for tourism and sightseeing, and hold the activity of “Chongqing Culture and Tourism Public-Benefit Consumption Season.”
To build itself into an international city of gourmet, it will also improve the gourmet standard system, expand global influence of such brands as “Chongqing Hot Pot,” “Chongqing Cuisine” and “Chongqing Xiao Mian”; explore the gourmet culture of different districts and counties, create the home of special cuisine; introduce international and domestic famous catering brands and gourmet.
Bringing in General Assembly of Union of International Fairs (UFI)
In terms of international exhibitions, it will upgrade the scale and level of current shows such as the Smart China Expo, the Western China International Fair for Investment and Trade and the Western China Tourism Industry Expo, introduce international exhibitions such as the General Assembly of UFI, and drive the consumption by exhibitions.
Meanwhile, it will develop close contact and cooperation with international sports organizations and national sports authorities to expand the influence of such events as the Chongqing International Marathon and Wulong International Mountain Outdoor Sports Open. It is going to actively introduce global high-level sports events, pre-game training series, tours, warm-ups, and invitational tournaments.
It will also cooperate with international organizations and other professional institutions to optimize characteristic activities such as the night market cultural festival and the hot pot cultural festival and support activities such as the fashion week and the film festival.
Full Wi-Fi coverage in main consumer places
The Opinions also mentions that Chongqing will optimize its international functions. It will achieve integrated rail-road-water-air transportation and ensure seamless transfer among main scenic areas, business circles, business complexes, and traffic stations.
Meanwhile, it plans to promote the construction of 5G and other new-generation information infrastructure, and achieve full coverage of fiber broadband and wireless networks in major consumer places; construct the infrastructure such as charging facilities for electric vehicles, public toilets, parking lots and barrier-free facilities, and accelerate the construction of intelligent service system for urban public parking; build international settlement and currency exchange platforms, speed up the planning and construction of international signage and service facilities for public places, and launch a convenient multilingual service platform.
Moreover, it’s slated to construct departure tax rebate demonstration streets, properly plan the layout of departure tax refund designated shops, coordinate the construction of international hotels, schools, hospitals, etc., to facilitate the living and working consumption of foreigners in Chongqing.
Source: Shangyou News