An international biological city in Chongqing Banan District is home to more than 80 biomedicine projects with an agreed potential production capacity of nearly 100 billion yuan (about 15.5 billion U.S. dollars).
Banan District has transformed into an international biological city. (Photo/ Banan District )
Since 2017, the district has made every effort to develop the biomedicine industry at Mudong, Banan District. In 2018, the area was renamed Chongqing International Biological City.
In 2019, it was approved as one of the national strategic emerging industry cluster development projects in the first batch. As of the end of 2020, the bio-city has attracted more than 80 major biomedicine R&D projects.
In the first quarter of 2021, enterprises above the designated size at the bio-city saw that the industrial output, industrial investment, and sales revenue increased by 40.13%, 23.74%, and 44.08%, respectively, year on year. Industrial development has achieved a good start, and a number of leading domestic biomedicine enterprises have moved in.
For instance, with over 13 billion yuan investment, the Zhirui Biomedicine Industry Park in the bio-city is the standalone biomedicine project with the largest investment in Chongqing so far. Chongqing Chen’an BioPharm Co., Ltd. is the first-class long-acting insulin R&D and production enterprise in China.
Owing to the introduction of the above leading projects, a number of innovative drugs have come out in the bio-city. A total of 10 innovative drug products such as the 9-valent HPV vaccine, interleukin-17, and oral paclitaxel have entered the clinical stage.
"Integrating upstream and downstream resources of the biopharmaceutical industry chain to form a complete industrial supporting system is a magic weapon for Chongqing International Biological City to attract leading biopharmaceutical enterprises to settle in," said an official of Banan District Commission of Economy and Information Technology.
During the 13th Five-Year Plan period, the bio-city completed an industrial investment of 31.5 billion yuan, started constructing 54 projects, put 38 projects into operation upon completion, and reaped the cumulative industrial output of 34.8 billion yuan, according to the data.
During the critical period of epidemic prevention and control in 2020, the annual output of biomedicine in the bio-city contributed 82.3% to the growth in the industrial output of the enterprises above the designated size in Banan District.
It can be seen that the biomedicine industry has played an increasingly important role in the district.