Original title: The western region promotes large-scale development with great opening up
On the afternoon of April 23, General Secretary Xi Jinping presided over a symposium on promoting the development of the western region in the new era in Chongqing and delivered an important speech. He stressed the need to persistently promote large-scale development through large-scale opening up and raise the level of opening up the western region to the outside world.
Over the past five years, the CPC Central Committee has made arrangements for promoting the large-scale development of the western region in the new era and forming a new pattern, and the western region has broken through its geographical disadvantages by continuously improving the level of opening up to the outside world, and has gradually formed an opening pattern in which land and sea are linked at home and abroad, and the east and west are mutually beneficial.
Promote the construction of a new land-sea corridor in the western region and create a new situation of opening up
On the morning of March 30, a train carrying 62 TEUs departed from the National Railway Freight Yard of the special railway line of Longtou Port in Fuling, Chongqing. The local products carried by the train were transferred to sea through Qinzhou Port Station in Guangxi, and finally shipped to 11 countries including Singapore, Italy, and Mexico. This is the first train of the new western land-sea corridor from the freight yard.
Connecting land and sea, running from east to west. The construction of the new land-sea corridor in the western region will be accelerated, so that the western region will completely break the embarrassing situation of "seeking the near and far" and "exporting goods from the west to the east" in the export of goods, and the provinces that are not along the border and not close to the sea can still open up.
On April 21, 2022, the first international freight train of the China-Laos Railway (Dunhuang-Vientiane-Bangkok, Gansu) of the Western Land-Sea New Corridor departed from Dunhuang, Gansu. Courtesy of Lanzhou Customs
In July 2022, with the issuance of the Dunhuang China-Laos Railway and the Dunhuang - Qinzhou Port - Western Indonesia New Land-Sea Corridor Asbestos Train, Gansu Dunhuang's asbestos products went abroad. Since then, the export scale of Dunhuang's special agricultural products has continued to expand, and red dates, raisins, red (black) wolfberries and other products and regions have been exported to more than 20 countries and regions.
Products have been shipped to the world with the help of the construction of the new western land-sea corridor, but at the same time, cross-border logistics companies are facing the problem of "heavy removal and light return" and high logistics costs. How to fix it?
At the end of May 2023, Ningxia organized relevant cross-border logistics companies to go to Thailand and Vietnam to hold discussions and exchanges with local international supply chain target enterprises. This discussion made Ningxia Xinhua Logistics Co., Ltd. gain a lot. Yan Xinhua, chairman of the company, said: "By signing cooperation agreements with relevant enterprises, we have realized the sharing of 18 yards in Thailand, Malaysia, Vietnam and other countries, and jointly built a new western land-sea channel of 'trade + logistics + distribution'. After we sell Ningxia's products to Southeast Asian countries, we will ship the products from Southeast Asia back to Ningxia on the return trip, realizing the two-way transportation of sea containers. ”
Up to now, Ningxia has set up a total of 158 overseas investment enterprises in 36 countries and regions, with an outward direct investment of US$4.615 billion.
The smooth operation of the new land-sea corridor in the western region is inseparable from the continuous improvement of railways and other infrastructure.
On December 21, 2023, the Xuyong-Bi section of the new Longhuang Railway was officially put into operation, opening up the intermediate bottleneck of the western line railway of the new western land-sea corridor and unblocking another passage from the Chengdu-Chongqing "double circle" to Guizhou.
Based on the breakthrough of this railway line, on January 12, 2024, Luzhou Port opened the first shuttle train of river-rail-sea intermodal transportation in the new land-sea corridor in western Sichuan. Leshan's Yuanming powder, Neijiang's glass fiber and Luzhou's chemicals finally arrived in Qinzhou, Guangxi through Luzhou Xuyong-Guizhou Bijie, Guiyang-Guangxi Liuzhou, and exported to Malaysia, Vietnam, Bangladesh and other countries.
Today, with Chongqing as the operation center and the western provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities as the key nodes, the new western land-sea corridor uses railways, seas, highways and other modes of transportation to cross mountains and seas, connect all places, and create a new situation of opening up the western region.
We will build a pilot free trade zone and expand high-level opening-up
Khorgos railway crossing. Photo by People's Daily Li Xinyang
On November 1, 2023, the China (Xinjiang) Pilot Free Trade Zone, the first pilot free trade zone established by the mainland in the northwest border region, was inaugurated. Seize the opportunity and take advantage of the situation. Only three months after its inauguration, more than 3,000 new enterprises have been added to the Xinjiang Pilot Free Trade Zone.
Not only new enterprises, but also local enterprises that have been rooted in Xinjiang for many years have also taken advantage of the east wind to seize the opportunity and fight for the start.
In 2023, the import and export trade volume of Khorgos Jinyi International Trade (Group) Co., Ltd. exceeded 10.5 billion yuan, reaching a record high, and in 2024, the company intends to combine the advantages of the free trade zone to further expand its business in Central Asia and European countries. Yu Chengzhong, general manager of the company, is full of confidence in the future. He said: "The general secretary stressed the need to promote the high-quality development of the pilot free trade zone. As a foreign trade enterprise, we have more confidence in taking root in the frontier and starting a business. ”
Vegetable planting base in Yangling Demonstration Zone Smart Agriculture Demonstration Park. Photo by People's Daily reporter Wu Chao
The Yangling Agricultural High-tech Industry Demonstration Zone, which covers the Yangling Area of the China (Shaanxi) Pilot Free Trade Zone and the Comprehensive Bonded Zone, has also embarked on its own path in promoting the opening up of the agricultural sector: 8 agricultural science and technology demonstration parks have been built in Kazakhstan and other countries, 54 foreign aid training projects have been carried out for SCO countries and developing countries, and 115 varieties and technical equipment such as soil improvement and photovoltaic irrigation have been shipped to overseas parks for testing and demonstration...... From exchange and training demonstration to economic and trade capacity cooperation, in recent years, the "golden seeds" carrying the "Yangling gene" have taken root and sprouted in the "Belt and Road" countries, bearing fruitful fruits of modern agricultural cooperation.
Statistics show that in the past five years, the mainland has laid out and built six pilot free trade zones in the western region. At present, the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, an important node of the China-Mongolia-Russia Economic Corridor and an important gateway of the new land-sea corridor in the western part of the country, is promoting the application for the construction of the pilot free trade zone.
The pilot free trade zone, guided by high-level opening-up and with institutional innovation as the core, has become an important platform to support the expansion of high-level opening-up in the western region.
Upgrade inter-regional interaction and cooperation, and expand new spaces for opening up
From April 17th to 20th, 11 well-known enterprises from the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area carried out the "Bay Enterprises in Guangxi" integrated investment inspection activities in Chongzuo City, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.
During this trip, the Bay enterprises and Chongzuo border counties (cities) have initially reached cooperation intentions on a number of industrial integration projects such as tea and light complementation, research and study tour camps, packaging materials, etc., and promoted the reasonable optimization of industrial layout and the cultivation of characteristic agricultural, cultural and tourism industry clusters in Chongzuo border counties (cities).
Guangdong-Guangxi cooperation has effectively promoted the economic development of Guangxi counties. The picture shows workers working in the production workshop of a new energy battery company in the Greater Bay Area located in Daxin County, Guangxi. Photo by People's Daily Online Fu Huazhou
"We will conscientiously implement the spirit of the general secretary's speech at the symposium on promoting the development of the western region in the new era, give full play to the advantages of being stationed in the bay area, accurately connect with the resources of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, and empower the construction of the new land-sea corridor in western Guangxi, the construction of the border port industrial park, the construction of the border economic cooperation zone, and the construction of the China-ASEAN industrial cooperation zone. On April 24, Li Jin, director of the Guangxi Comprehensive Service Center for the Construction of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, said in an interview with reporters.
Upgrading inter-regional interaction and cooperation and expanding new space for opening up not only promotes the industrial innovation and development of developed regions, but also enhances its radiation and driving to underdeveloped regions. At present, the story of active service docking with major regional strategies and cross-regional "hand-in-hand" is being staged everywhere.
Dongguan Mingyue Arts & Crafts Co., Ltd. is a handicraft development and sales enterprise, products are exported to overseas. In 2020, the company plans to build a new factory on the basis of the existing plant in Guangdong. Bijie City, Guizhou Province has been to Dongguan for many times to promote, which makes Wang Dongyang, general manager of the company, dispel the idea of "building a factory without leaving Guangdong". In 2021, Bijie Mingyue Arts and Crafts Co., Ltd. will land. Today, the company's annual output value is nearly 100 million yuan.
Mingyue Company's transition from Guangdong to Guizhou is a vivid practice of Guizhou's active integration into the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area. In recent years, Guizhou has explored cooperation models such as "Greater Bay Area Headquarters + Guizhou Base", "Greater Bay Area R&D + Guizhou Manufacturing", "Greater Bay Area Enterprises + Guizhou Resources", "Greater Bay Area Market + Guizhou Products", etc., to provide momentum for the integrated development of industries in the two places.
Guizhou is actively integrating into the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, while Yunnan is working with Shanghai to jointly build the Shanghai-Yunnan Lingang Kunming Science and Technology City in the Kunming Economic and Technological Development Zone (Kunming Area of the Pilot Free Trade Zone). Taking advantage of its proximity to the China-Laos Railway Freight Station, the Science and Technology City has introduced industries in the Yangtze River Delta in a linkage manner, and 49 enterprises have signed contracts so far.
Qinghai, located on the plateau, has also benefited from inter-regional interaction and cooperation. On March 29 this year, Qinghai held a green computing industry development promotion conference in Beijing, and 8 cooperation projects in the field of green computing power were signed on the spot.
The linkage between land and sea at home and abroad, and the mutual assistance between east and west, will show the western part of China, which is becoming more vibrant, more open and confident, in front of the world.
On April 10, 23 tons of Nyingchi apples were exported to Nepal through the Jilong port in southwest Tibet, marking the first export of local fruits from Tibet.
In the western region, as opening up to the outside world continues to expand in all directions and in all fields, such a "first" will become an "innumerable time."
(Gao Hongxia, Zhu Hong, Guo Ying, Peng Qian, Hu Hong, Fu Huazhou, Gao Xiang, Li Faxing, Long Zhangyu, Jia Ru, Zhao Jing, Fu Hao, Yang Rui, Li Long, Chen Xinhui, Wu Chao, Fu Lijuan, Kou Yanan, Yang Qihong, Li Haixia)