The 7th CIIE | The free trade pilot zone in the Yangtze River Economic Belt issued an initiative for

Xinhua News Agency, Shanghai, November 5 (Reporters Yang Youzong and Xie Xiyao) On the 5th, at the 7th Hongqiao International Economic Forum, the Ministry of Commerce held a special promotion event for the "Invest in China" free trade pilot zone and released the "Yangtze River Economic Belt Free Trade Pilot Zone Coordinated Development Initiative".

Promoting the coordinated development of free trade pilot zones in provinces and cities along the Yangtze River is an important means to better play the role of free trade pilot zones in institutional innovation and trial. The initiative mainly includes six aspects, namely, actively integrating into and serving national strategies, promoting high-level opening up in a coordinated manner, strengthening coordinated experiments with institutional innovation as the core, further promoting cross-regional sharing of factors and resources, highlighting characteristics and advantages to strengthen industrial collaborative cooperation, and focusing on improving the level of coordinated linkage of free trade pilot zones.

During the event, free trade pilot zones along the Yangtze River, such as Shanghai, Hubei, and Chongqing, introduced their representative industries for developing new quality productivity. Wu Xiaohua, deputy secretary of the Party Working Committee of Lingang New Area of China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone, said that since its unveiling in August 2019, the GDP of Lingang New Area has increased by an average of 19.8% per year, the total industrial output value of enterprises above designated size has increased by an average of 34.6% per year, and the fixed asset investment of the whole society has increased by an average of 33.4% per year, and the regional economic scale has reached a new level.

"Now, 1/9 of the industrial output value above designated size, 1/4 of the fixed asset investment in manufacturing, and 1/4 of the major science and technology industry projects in Shanghai are in Lingang New Area." Wu Xiaohua said.

Qin Shubin, deputy director of the Administrative Committee of Chongqing Liangjiang New Area, said that Chongqing Pilot Free Trade Zone aims to play an important role as a strategic fulcrum for the development of the western region and a link between the "Belt and Road" and the Yangtze River Economic Belt, increase the opening of gateway cities in the western region, take the lead in opening up and drive opening up in the western region, and strive to build an inland open comprehensive hub.

"At present, the free trade pilot zones, with less than 0.4% of the country's land area, contribute nearly 1/5 of China's foreign investment and total import and export volume, and have become an important first choice for foreign-funded enterprises to take root in China and serve the world." Tang Wenhong, Assistant Minister of Commerce, said that in 2024, China will continue to increase the opening-up efforts in key areas of the free trade pilot zones, introduce and implement a negative list for cross-border service trade in the free trade pilot zones, and carry out open pilot projects in telecommunications, medical and other fields.