Chongqing — The 3rd Western China International Fair for Investment and Trade (WCIFIT) and 2021 CCI-ILSTC International Cooperation Forum successfully concluded on May 23. This year's fair gave full play to the role of trade cooperation platform, and investment promotion platform held more than 100 activities such as investment promotion, economic, and trade negotiations, and signed 359 projects with a total contract value of 357.82 billion yuan (about USD 55.68 billion).

Fruitful results

Thi 3rd WCIFIT signed 359 projects with a total contract value of 357.82 billion yuan. There were 102 centralized contracted projects with an amount of 228.5 billion yuan, covering more than 20 fields such as information technology, high-end equipment, biotechnology, and clean energy; 257 off-site contracted projects with an amount of 129.32 billion yuan. There are three main characteristics of centralized contract projects.

According to a member of the Organizing Committee of WCIFIT, one of the signing highlights is that there are a host of big projects and enterprises, and the investment in the projects is high. The average investment in the signed projects is RMB 2.24 billion, among which 17 projects, such as the HKC display module production line, have an investment of more than RMB 5 billion. Project investors are mainly from large centrally administered SOEs, Fortune Global 500 foreign enterprises, and well-known private enterprises. These include State Power Investment Corporation Limited (SPIC), China Three Gorges, Dongfang Electric, Goldman Sachs, Panasonic, Magna, East Hope, Sinosynergy.

Among the hundreds of projects signed, the manufacturing industry dominates, with 48 projects signed such as Yadea Electric Vehicle Import and Export Production and Manufacturing Base, with the contracted investment of RMB 120.98 billion, which will help Chongqing promote the advanced industrial base and modernization of the industrial chain as well as enhance the stability and competitiveness of the supply chain and the industrial chain.

The third is green development becomes a highlight. Clean energy and green development became the hot fields for investment, with 11 projects signed and contract investment of RMB 34.4 billion.

Brilliant Insights

According to Zhang Zhikui, director of the Organizing Committee of WCIFIT, at the opening ceremony of the WCIFIT and 2021 CCI-ILSTC International Cooperation Forum, 21 guests also put forward lots of brilliant opinions and suggestions to provide new ideas for the joint construction ILSTC and promote the high-quality opening of the western region to the outside world.

Domestic and foreign guests generally believe that the signing of RCEP provides a major opportunity to enhance the function of the ILSTC, which will further expand the space for economic and trade cooperation between Western China and ASEAN, effectively increase the scale of trade and investment, improve the industrial chain, and stabilize the supply chain. Among the proposals put forward by the guests, more than one-third of the proposals related to RCEP and the high-quality construction of ILSTC.

In addition, guests from Vietnam, Indonesia, Singapore, and the Philippines suggested that they hope to strengthen the industrial cooperation between Chongqing and ASEAN and jointly promote the implementation of import and export trade and two-way investment projects in the fields of automobile and motorcycle, equipment manufacturing, electronic information, and petrochemical industries.

Abundant exhibition content

This year's fair has set up a total of 8 themed exhibition halls with an area of 110,000 square meters were set up. And online exhibition halls were set up simultaneously, showing the new results of opening up and cooperation in the western region in an all-around way.

At the N3 International Exhibition Hall, the International Cooperation Exhibition Area is featured by the shape of a “compass,” an instrument used by the ancients to distinguish directions. Notably, the shape carries the meaning of intermingling routes from different directions and the meaning of fusion and integration.

By adding the design elements of container and ship, the International Cooperation Exhibition Area also tries to display the flourishing economic trade scenes along the Belt and Road and highlight the important strategic meaning of the New International Land-Sea Trade Corridor (ILSTC).

The Guest of Honor Area will display the exchange results between China and the guests of honor of Vietnam, Indonesia, and Colombia in such fields as infrastructure construction, investment, trade, finance, communications, e-commerce, tourism, and culture.

The African Comprehensive Exhibition Area displayed cooperation projects between China and African countries in manufacturing, food, medical treatment, housing, economic trade, tourism, transportation, other aspects, and characteristic products of African countries.