At the beginning of 2022, more than 100 workers were accelerating the production of pram cloth covers, plush toys, and other products in the 2,000-square-meter workshop in Anfu Town, Rongchang District of Chongqing. It is a satellite plant of Sichuan Hobbies Baby Products Co., Ltd. in Longchang, Sichuan Province. "The existing plants have difficulty fulfilling the current orders, so we set up a satellite plant in Chongqing to solve the pressing problem," said the company's head.

Industrial development is always one of the most important sectors for the cooperation between Chengdu and Chongqing. Establishing a modern industrial system is the key to building the Chengdu-Chongqing economic circle. The two cities have already reached the consensus of advancing high-quality development through industrial cooperation. Several agreements have been signed, and quite a few achievements have been made, especially in such aspects as hydrogen vehicles and the complementation of the industrial supply chain.

Joint efforts of competitive industries

Since the start of the Chengdu-Chongqing economic circle, both sides have reached cooperation agreements and made concerted efforts in the common competitive industries to build industrial clusters jointly with international competitiveness.

At the Third Session of Chongqing-Sichuan Party and Government Joint Meeting convened in May 2021, two documents about the automobile and electronic information industry were reviewed. The two industries mentioned in the documents are promising in both Sichuan and Chongqing, and they are the most expected to form world-class clusters.

Subsequently, the Sichuan-Chongqing automobile and electronic information industrial chain supply-demand matchmaking platforms were established successively. In the first quarter of 2021, the electronic information industry in two places developed at an impressive rate, achieving revenue of more than 1.7 trillion yuan. The automotive production value is more than 500 billion yuan.

From the related plan for Chengdu and Chongqing, a new industrial cluster at a one-trillion-yuan level is expected to form there. According to another plan, by 2025, a distinctive and systematic demonstration zone for the integrated development of the industrial Internet in the Chengdu-Chongqing area will be built. It will become a new hub for the innovative development of the industrial Internet nationwide.

The layout of the hydrogen industrial chain

At present, Sichuan and Chongqing have completed the layout of the entire hydrogen industrial chain, which has gathered more than 200 enterprises and research institutes engaged in the production, storage, transportation, refueling, and usage of hydrogen energy. The two places are slated to put 400 hydrogen fuel delivery vehicles in two batches on Chengdu-Chongqing Hydrogen Corridor and plan to build hydrogen refueling stations and erect hydrogen supply bases in Tongnan, Changshou, Liangshan, Panzhihua, and other places. It will serve the whole of western China to develop the hydrogen energy and fuel cell industries.

The past two years witnessed drastic changes in the domestic and foreign environment of the automobile industry, especially the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. This helps to form an industrial community relationship and mutual assistance among related enterprises in two places. 

At the end of 2021, Chengdu and Chongqing set a new goal of jointly developing the automobile industry. Their economy and information departments signed the Strategic Cooperation Agreement on Co-building a World-Class Advanced Automobile Industrial Cluster. With the orientation towards new energy and connected automated vehicles, their cooperation will be conducted in planning synchronization, technological breakthrough making, and other aspects to jointly develop a world-class cluster for the automobile industry. By 2025, the two sides are expected to produce three million vehicles, with a value totaling 600 billion yuan.

Integrated development of Sichuan-Chongqing enterprises

Sichuan and Chongqing will implement plans made by the CPC Central Committee and create new drivers for promoting high-quality development across the country. They keep making concerted efforts in industrial development, especially in deepening cooperation and in forming clusters by improving weak links in the industrial supply chain. 

Currently, lots of enterprises in both places have cooperated in many fields, such as industrial supporting and talent cooperation. Chang'an Automobile has more than 270 suppliers and 99 distributors among leading enterprises in Chongqing, including 62 in Sichuan. Sokon Group owns 37 supporting enterprises in Sichuan, and its total value of procurement exceeded one billion yuan in 2021.

Collaboration and interaction among Sichuan-Chongqing industrial parks are also conducted in an orderly manner. May 2021 saw the licensing ceremony of the first batch of 20 Sichuan-Chongqing industrial cooperation demonstration parks, which cover 20 cities and districts of the two places, including Deyang and Jiangjin. These parks focus on key industrial clusters of electronic information, automobiles and motorcycles, equipment manufacturing, and consumer goods. Based on their own resources, they have formed a lot of industrial cooperation demonstration projects of different types, such as functional co-construction, industrial supporting, and resource development.