Advancing opening-up in Shenzhen

China's latest policy moves, centered around deepening comprehensive reform in Shenzhen, signal the country's firm determination to pursue high-quality development through innovation, institutional transformation and high-standard opening-up, officials and experts said in Beijing on Thursday.

This year marks the 45th anniversary of the establishment of the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone and the fifth anniversary of the implementation of the Shenzhen comprehensive reform pilot.

China has issued a document on deepening the comprehensive reform in Shenzhen to advance innovation and opening-up, demonstrating the country's firm commitment to expanding reform, said Li Chunlin, deputy head of the National Development and Reform Commission, at a new conference of the State Council Information Office.

"This document highlights the pioneering and demonstrative role of the reforms. Related explorations will play a crucial role in demonstrating and leading," Li said.

"Guangdong will support Shenzhen in deepening the reform of market-oriented allocation of production factors, empowering the real economy through financial, technological and data resources. It will foster the development of long-term and patient capital in Shenzhen, and improve supportive mechanisms to facilitate personnel mobility," said Zhang Hu, executive vice-governor of Guangdong province.

In terms of building a high-standard opening-up system, Guangdong will continue to support Shenzhen in aligning with high-standard international economic and trade rules, while further facilitating cross-border trade procedures, Zhang said.

"Moving forward, we will further open-up service sectors in key fields like telecommunications, healthcare and finance, so as to contribute more replicable practices for expanding China's service industry openness," said Zhang.

The Ministry of Science and Technology will facilitate establishing robust rules for technology firm credit, sci-tech achievement trading and intellectual property transactions, to provide technological support for fostering new competitive edges and growth drivers in Shenzhen's development, said Miao Hong, deputy secretary-general of the ministry.

"Shenzhen will make efforts to build a high-level international trade hub, accelerate the establishment of medium- to long-term mechanisms for sustained import-export growth and vigorously upgrade goods trade while pioneering service trade innovation," said Qin Weizhong, mayor of Shenzhen.

The NDRC will conduct timely evaluations and reviews. For smoothly executed measures with tangible results, The NDRC will proactively extend application scenarios and deepen explorations to generate replicable outcomes as quickly as possible, Li said.

"For proven effective practices, we will proactively promote wider replication through policy frameworks, local standards and exemplary cases. This will enable the comprehensive reform trials to make greater contributions to advancing China's all-round reform," Li added.

"These measures will advance trade facilitation. New forms and models of trade could lower trade costs and enhance trade efficiency, thereby promoting robust growth in goods trade," said Wang Peng, a researcher at the Beijing Academy of Social Sciences.

For service trade, innovative policies can propel its extension into higher value-added segments, thus enhancing international competitiveness, Wang added.

As a forefront of reform and opening-up, Shenzhen's pilot program could explore and accumulate experiences worthy for reference, facilitating nationwide efforts to comprehensively deepen reform and advance institutional innovation, Wang said.