Chongqing- Chongqing government officials briefed local conditions to the present cross-Straits joint interview delegation to Sichuan and Chongqing on July 16. Their speeches touched upon topics of Chongqing-Taiwan exchanges and cooperation, the Chengdu-Chongqing economic circle, and the city's opening-up.
Chongqing and Taiwan
Chen Quan, director of the Taiwan Affairs Office of the Chongqing Municipal People's Government, mentioned ways to promote the integrated development of Chongqing and Taiwan from aspects of exchanges at the grassroots level, business, and trade, as well as culture and people-to-people exchanges.
For example, it has been seventeen years to hold the appealing Chongqing and magnificent Three Gorges grassroots exchange between Chongqing and Taiwan. Representatives from Taiwan have been invited to visit communities and exhibition halls in Chongqing, so as to deepen understanding of the Chinese mainland and cross-Straits friendship.
Together with Sichuan, Chongqing held the 2020 cross-Straits (Chongqing) youth entrepreneurship development exchange and invited more than 70 young Taiwan entrepreneurs for communication.
As of December 2020, Chongqing had approved a total of 1,867 Taiwan-funded enterprises and 214 of them invested more than 10 million USD. From January to May this year, the trade volume between Chongqing and Taiwan reached RMB 26.7 billion, an increase of 52.9% year on year. Economic and trade exchanges between Chongqing and Taiwan have shown strong momentum. Taiwan is already Chongqing's fourth-largest trading partner.
Chengdu-Chongqing economic circle
Li Minglu, deputy director of the Chongqing Development and Reform Commission, introduced the Chengdu-Chongqing economic circle from aspects of such as transportation development and industrial coordination.
The Chengdu-Chongqing area has been building an integrated transportation development. The National Development and Reform Commission and the Ministry of Transport have jointly issued a comprehensive transportation development plan for the Chengdu-Chongqing economic circle.
As bullet trains at 350 km/h have been operated, it only takes 62 minutes from Chongqing to Chengdu and vice versa. Moreover, there are 13 Sichuan-Chongqing provincial expressways and six more are under construction.
In addition, 20 industrial parks have been selected as the first batch of demonstration bases for industrial cooperation.
Opening-up of Chongqing
Xu Chengxin, deputy director of the Chongqing Municipal Commission of Commerce, talked about the city opening-up from an international logistics hub in inland China to opening-up platforms and from open economy to business environment.
The Yangtze River waterway works as the main channel for foreign trade eastward. More than 8,000 trans of the China Railway Express to Europe (Yuxinou) westward have been operated. Southward, the New International Land-Sea Trade Corridor has become a national strategy, covering 96 countries and regions and 250 ports. The Chongqing-Manzhouli-Russia international railway train northward effectively connects the China-Mongolia-Russia economic corridor. Moreover, a total of 105 international and regional routes have been opened in Chongqing, and the annual passenger throughput has exceeded 40 million.
Chongqing has four national strategic platforms, seven national-level economic development zones and high-tech zones, five bonded areas, and four bonded logistics centers.
Among them, the China-Singapore (Chongqing) Demonstration Project on Strategic Connectivity, as the third intergovernmental cooperation project between China and Singapore, mainly covers four key areas of cooperation- financial services, aviation industry, transportation logistics, as well as information and communications. China (Chongqing) Pilot Free Trade Zone, which was unveiled in April 2017, attracted more than 40% of the total foreign direct investment in Chongqing. The Western (Chongqing) Science City aims to be a scientific and technological innovation center with national influence.