Relying on its international land port, Huaihua has gone all out to attract investment, promote foreign trade and stabilize foreign investment. (Photo/Zhang Zhuo) 

Since the beginning of the year, Huaihua has, in line with the “three highlands and four new missions” vision, thoroughly implemented the “five new missions and four orientations” strategy. By taking advantage of the New International Land-Sea Trade Corridor and the Great International Land-Sea Trade Corridor, connecting the Pacific Ocean and the Indian Ocean and serving the domestic and international economic flows, the city has made headway in investment promotion in both quantity and quality, seen steady growth in foreign trade, and achieved good results in building open economy. 

Building a Strong Open Platform

Seizing the strategic development opportunities of the Belt and Road Initiative and the New International Land-Sea Trade Corridor, Huaihua has been active in applying for and building the national open port, comprehensive cross-border e-commerce pilot zone, bonded logistic center and other platforms; pooled strength to build the Huaihua International Land Port; and worked to improve the functions of the land port, upgrade the level of the land port and accelerate the development of the port industry across the board. Meanwhile, by taking advantage of the first Hunan (Huaihua) RCEP Economic and Trade Expo and other RCEP-related activities, the city has actively organized city-wide enterprises to participate in the expo and supported local enterprises to “go global”. From January to October this year, Huaihua’s total import and export value reached RMB7.31 billion, a year-on-year increase of 115%, ranking first in Hunan Province in growth rate for 17 months straight. 

Comprehensively Enhancing Investment Promotion

Since the beginning of the year, Huaihua Municipal Party Committee and People’s Government of Huaihua City have prioritized the utilization of foreign investment. Municipal leaders have taken the initiative to come to the front line of investment promotion, putting it on the top of the agenda. Meanwhile, an array of foreign-funded projects have been planned around advantageous industries such as bag & suitcase, electronic information, new materials and biomedicine as well as advantageous resources including wind, solar and water resources, in a bid to attract foreign-funded enterprises to invest and cooperate. From January to October, 18 new foreign-funded enterprises were established, and foreign capital of USD57.91 million was utilized, a year-on-year increase of 423.6%. The city ranked first in terms of the progress of objective completion and third in terms of the total amount and growth rate in Hunan Province. 15 counties, cities and districts (including Huaihua Hi-tech Industrial Development Zone and Huaihua International Land Port Economic Development Zone) managed to attract foreign investment for the first time. 

Going all out to Upgrade Services for Enterprises

Since the beginning of the year, Huaihua has carried out the “100-day breakthrough” action to stabilize foreign trade. Multiple departments have jointly visited and inspected enterprises to gain a deeper insight into their difficulties and problems in foreign trade and stepped up support and introduced favorable policies for foreign trade enterprises. A foreign-funded service team has also been set up to provide one-to-one and one-stop targeted services for foreign-funded enterprises and enterprises investing abroad on a regular basis. The team keeps abreast of the demands of enterprises and actively applies for foreign economic cooperation subsidies for enterprises. This year, the team has applied for provincial foreign economic cooperation subsidies of RMB1.77 million for three enterprises. The team also arranges dedicated personnel to offer follow-up services in project negotiation and company registration. Thanks to such considerate services, enterprises including China Power International and Hunan Huaxin New Materials managed to establish enterprises and obtain funds in the same month as they submitted relevant applications.

According to relevant responsible person from Huaihua Bureau of Commerce, going forward, Huaihua will continuously stick to the development goals of “building Huaihua International Land Port, advancing open economy, and maintaining the fast and sound growth of main indicators of open economy”, go all out to attract investment, promote foreign trade and stabilize foreign investment, drive the high-quality development of open economy in Huaihua across the board, and open wider this “west gate” of Hunan. 

（Translated by Yu Jie）