The port of Huizhou, Guangdong Province is busy. Photo courtesy of Huizhou Dongjiang Photo Agency

The Central Economic Work Conference requires that we should accurately grasp the requirements of the economic work deployment in 2023, dare to take responsibility, be good at taking action, observe the facts, and creatively implement them, strive to achieve the main expected goals of economic development in 2023, and promote high-quality development with new atmosphere and new actions to achieve new results.

The spring tide is surging, and everything is competing. At present, all regions and departments are actively implementing the spirit of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China and the Central Economic Work Conference, and have broken down and assigned tasks for the economic work throughout the year to ensure that they are actively and orderly promoted and efficiently completed. Starting today, this edition will launch a series of reports on "Economically Powerful Provinces Bravely Take the Lead", taking Guangdong, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Shandong, Henan, Sichuan and other economically powerful provinces as samples to show the direction and key measures of the local efforts to take the lead and take the lead, and convey the firm confidence in promoting high-quality development and achieving new results.

--Editor

In February, Lingnan is already full of spring and colorful flowers; on the coast of the South China Sea, the sea and sky are in harmony, and the spring tide is surging.

Under the Lingdingyang, the pouring of the main project of the Shenzhen-Zhongshan Channel immersed tube tunnel has officially ended; at the Nansha Port terminal, a ro-ro ship loaded with more than 2,000 domestically produced cars is heading to the Middle East; in the land of South Guangdong, the construction of 1,530 key projects with a total investment of about 8.4 trillion yuan has been launched one after another.

A year's plan begins in spring. "We will work hard this year, the next five years, and the next 10 and 30 years to strive to create a new Guangdong and a new miracle that will impress the world." The main responsible comrade of the Guangdong Provincial Party Committee said.

Inspire new momentum for the development of a major economic province

Driving along the Pearl River Delta Ring Expressway, the machines in the factory workshops along the way roar, people come and go in the streets and alleys, and the roads and railways flow smoothly... The land of South Guangdong is rising with surging vitality.

"From the production of down jackets to the production of microwave ovens, to the current production and development of a full range of smart home appliances, from manual workshops to automated production lines, and then to today's intelligent unmanned workshops, the 40 years that Galanz has gone through are the "smile curve" that many private enterprises in the Pearl River Delta have walked together." Liang Zhaoxian, chairman and president of Galanz Group, said.

"Midea drives development with innovation, continuously improves the security level of the industrial chain and supply chain, and dares to explore new paths and stimulate new momentum." Fang Hongbo, chairman of Midea Group, said: In the past three years, Midea has accumulated more than 25 billion yuan in new investment in Guangdong. Only by firmly investing in the future, investing in technology, and investing in talents can we gain the upper hand in future competition.

After more than 40 years of magnificent reform and opening up, Guangdong, starting from a relatively backward agricultural province, has "crossed the river by feeling the stones" all the way, vividly interpreting the development miracle of early spring in Lingnan and surging Pearl River.

From Industry 2.0 to Industry 4.0, from "Pearl River water, Guangdong grain, Lingnan clothing, Guangdong home appliances", to the continuous upgrading of industries such as automobiles, industrial robots, and drones; starting from "three-in-one" to the competitive development of private, foreign-funded, and state-owned economic types, Guangdong has become an important global manufacturing base.

Statistics show that in the past five years, Guangdong's GDP has crossed three trillion-level steps, exceeding 12.9 trillion yuan in 2022, ranking first in China for 34 consecutive years; there are 67,000 industrial enterprises above designated size, an increase of 20,000 in five years; there are 69,000 high-tech enterprises, more than doubling in five years.

Today, Guangdong has laid a solid foundation for the accumulation of quantity. However, it is unavoidable that the overall growth of Guangdong has reached a plateau period, and the transformation of kinetic energy, climbing over obstacles, and qualitative breakthroughs are still in the brewing stage. It is urgent to plan and cultivate more new development momentum from a higher starting point to create an important growth pole and power source for high-quality development.

Build a strategic industrial cluster matrix

Walking into the GAC Intelligent New Energy Vehicle Industrial Park in Panyu, Guangzhou, robots are waving their arms on the intelligent production line, automatic guided transport vehicles are shuttling back and forth, and new energy vehicles are moving forward one after another on the conveyor belt. "Here, relying on the GAC Aion industrial chain, dozens of upstream and downstream supporting enterprises in the fields of "three electric" key technologies, digital smart cockpits, and autonomous driving are gathered around, forming a huge industrial cluster and building a complete new energy vehicle industrial chain system." Gu Huinan, general manager of GAC Aion, introduced.

Coincidentally, Shenzhen BYD, a hundred kilometers away, stopped producing fuel vehicles from March 2022, becoming the world's first automaker to stop producing fuel vehicles; in 2022, BYD's annual sales exceeded 1.86 million vehicles, a year-on-year increase of 152.5%, becoming the world's number one in new energy vehicle sales. "We will continue to play the leading role of leading enterprises in demonstration and promotion, and help Guangdong accelerate the construction of a modern industrial system." BYD Senior Vice President He Zhiqi said.

With BYD and GAC Aion New Energy Vehicles as the forerunners, Guangdong's automotive industry revenue exceeded 1 trillion yuan for the first time in 2022, becoming Guangdong's eighth industrial cluster with a revenue of over 1 trillion yuan.

In order to cultivate and develop strategic pillar industry clusters and strategic emerging industry clusters, Guangdong has issued a plan to build ten strategic pillar industry clusters, including a new generation of electronic information, smart home appliances, automotive industry, software and information services, biomedicine and health, as well as ten strategic emerging industry clusters, including semiconductors and integrated circuits, high-end equipment manufacturing, intelligent robots, blockchain and quantum information, and new energy. Guangdong has built a trillion-yuan industrial cluster matrix, and "Guangdong Smart Manufacturing" has accelerated its leap to the middle and high-end of the global industrial chain, supporting the high-quality development of the local manufacturing industry.

The 2023 Guangdong Provincial Government Work Report proposes to focus on the real economy, adhere to the manufacturing industry, accelerate the construction of a strong manufacturing province and a quality-strong province, and establish a higher pillar of the modern industrial system. Tu Gaokun, Secretary of the Party Leadership Group and Director of the Guangdong Provincial Department of Industry and Information Technology, said: Guangdong Province is focusing on implementing the five major improvement actions of "big industry", "big platform", "big project", "big enterprise" and "big environment", planning to create several new trillion-yuan and 500 billion-yuan industrial clusters, and forward-looking layout of future industries; concentrate on building a number of industrial park platforms to promote Guangdong to accelerate the transition from a manufacturing province to a manufacturing powerhouse.

"Guangdong started with manufacturing in the past, and will also rely on manufacturing to win the future and stand up the industrial backbone of Guangdong's modernization construction at a new height." The main responsible comrades of the Guangdong Provincial Government said.

Building a new pattern of high-level opening up

With a long whistle, the China-Europe Express, loaded with liquid crystal display panels and electronic components needed for the production of TCL Group's Polish factory, slowly drove out from Xiayuan Station of Guangzhou Freight Center and will arrive in Malaszewicze, Poland in 15 days. "The opening of the China-Europe Express from Guangzhou to Malaszewicze has given us another convenient transportation line connecting China," said the person in charge of TCL Group's Polish factory. Li Dongsheng, chairman of TCL Group, said: Enterprises can effectively promote the export of related core components, materials and equipment by establishing a complete industrial chain and supply chain system around the world.

In the Guangzhou Nansha Comprehensive Bonded Zone, containers are accurately connected to the material entrance; not far away, batches of fashionable household products are quickly shipped to countries and regions along the "Belt and Road" after weighing, labeling, customs declaration, inspection and release. Between the inbound and outbound, "buying the world" and "selling the world" go hand in hand, laying a solid foundation for the development of Guangdong's foreign trade.

From the export of labor-intensive products such as clothing, shoes and socks, to the export of household electrical and electrical products, and then to the export of automobiles and high-tech products, in recent years, Guangdong's foreign trade has increased in both quantity and quality, successfully achieved the transformation and upgrading of foreign trade product exports, and continuously promoted the high-quality development of trade.

The sea outside the Donghai Island in Zhanjiang, western Guangdong, is one color, and the construction of BASF's Zhanjiang integrated base is gradually getting better. After the first set of 60,000 tons of modified engineering plastics per year was officially put into production, the construction of the integrated base has been fully launched. Bruderm¨¹ller, Chairman of the Executive Board of BASF Europe, said: After the completion of the Zhanjiang integrated base, it will become BASF's third largest integrated production base in the world, contributing to the sustainable development of China and even the world.

As a province with an export-oriented economy, by the end of 2021, Guangdong Province had approved the establishment of nearly 289,000 foreign-invested enterprises and utilized US$523.91 billion in foreign capital; in 2022, Guangdong actually utilized 181.9 billion yuan in foreign capital and established 13,365 new foreign direct investment enterprises.

"Guangdong has established the development measures of "five external linkages" of foreign trade, foreign investment, outsourcing, foreign economic cooperation and foreign intelligence. In terms of foreign investment, the local government has vigorously carried out special actions to attract investment in the manufacturing industry, and has done a good job in attracting investment from chain leaders, hidden champions, future industries and science and technology projects." Zhang Jinsong, Secretary of the Party Committee and Director of the Guangdong Provincial Department of Commerce, said that Guangdong will build a large investment promotion pattern and focus on establishing a new mechanism for integrated investment promotion for domestic and foreign investment.

In addition, Guangdong has deepened the construction of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, promoted the connection of rules and mechanisms among the three places, and comprehensively promoted the construction of the two cooperation zones of Hengqin and Qianhai. At present, the construction of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area and the Shenzhen Pilot Demonstration Zone has been deepened, and the construction of the three major platforms of Hengqin, Qianhai and Nansha has started steadily, and the major benefits of the superposition of multiple national strategies have become increasingly prominent. Guangdong is working with Hong Kong and Macao to accelerate the construction of an international first-class bay area and a world-class city cluster.

Accelerate the forging of the whole process innovation ecological chain

On February 8, on Nan'ao Island in Shantou, the "Nan'ao Science Conference", a new discussion platform aimed at global cutting-edge basic research, was officially launched; in Huizhou, the two major scientific facilities of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the "Accelerator Driven Transmutation Research Facility" and the "High Current Heavy Ion Accelerator Facility", are being accelerated; in Shenzhen Guangming Science City, the industrial chain is laid out around the innovation chain, and 9 major scientific and technological infrastructures have both research platform and industrial platform attributes, which are shared by the academic community and open to the industry...

At present, the number of high-tech enterprises in Guangdong exceeds 60,000, the number of valid invention patents is nearly 440,000, and the number of PCT international patent applications has reached 26,000. The regional innovation capacity has led China for 6 consecutive years.

The report of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China proposed to strengthen basic research, highlight originality, and encourage free exploration. For a long time, relying on the main body of enterprises, Guangdong's industrialization of scientific and technological achievements has been powerful, efficient, and fruitful, building Guangdong's innovative competitive advantage. However, the insufficient construction of the upstream links represented by basic research capabilities has inhibited the further enhancement of the industrialization capabilities of the downstream links, and has become a key shortcoming that restricts the further improvement of Guangdong's innovation capabilities.

The drone industry is Shenzhen's advantageous industry. In 2022, the output value of China's drone industry will reach more than 117 billion yuan, Shenzhen accounts for about 2/3 of China's, and exports account for more than 90% of China's total. In Shenzhen, the drone industry has formed a full-process innovation ecosystem driven by leading enterprises such as DJI, Daotong, and Qianxing, supported by the industrial chain, supported by research institutions, and participated by the whole society.

"Guangdong will accelerate the construction of a full-process innovation ecosystem and strengthen the deep integration innovation system of industry, academia, research and application with enterprises as the main body and the market as the guide." Gong Guoping, Secretary of the Party Committee and Director of the Guangdong Provincial Department of Science and Technology, said: Guangdong will increase investment in scientific research, gather innovative talents, focus on key links such as industrial development needs and new products, new processes, new equipment, and new materials, strengthen technical research, promote the transformation of scientific and technological achievements into advantageous productivity, and support high-quality development.

Guangdong is currently concentrating its efforts on breaking through a number of key core technologies. In the ten-year "Excellent Guangdong" plan for basic and applied basic research, it is expected that more than one-third of the provincial science and technology innovation strategic special funds will be invested in basic research to accelerate the construction of the Greater Bay Area Quantum Science Center and the National Center for Applied Mathematics. Guangdong will also seize the major opportunity of building a high-level talent base in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, continuously optimize the environment for attracting talents and wisdom, enhance the attractiveness of talents, and promote the strengthening and upgrading of Guangdong's manufacturing industry.

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