Old industrial bases get cash
(China Daily)
Updated: 2004-02-02 14:54

China hopes to revitalize its traditional industrial zones with a huge infusion of cash.

Liaoning Province was the biggest recipient in the first round of "blood transfusion" money aimed at giving new life to the industrial sector. The money will go to 100 projects, half of them in Liaoning, mainly in the manufacturing and raw material industries.

An official from the provincial development and reform department told China Daily the projects need about 44.2 billion yuan (US$5.3 billion).

About 11.2 billion yuan (US$1.34 billion) will be invested into 37 projects in Heilongjiang Province, but no details were released as to what those projects are.

Another 11 projects in Jilin Province were given the green light in their restructuring bids. That nod will cost the government 6 billion yuan (US$722 million), said Cao Dawei, deputy-director of provincial department of development and reform.

Cao said the money will mainly go towards the petrochemistry, agriculture and medicine research industries.

Since the central government launched its restructuring campaigns in 2002, Jilin has identified dozens of projects in need of more than 40 billion yuan (US$4.76 billion) in investment.

Government insiders said nearly one sixth of the total investment in the 100 projects will come from State revenue. But the National Development and Reform Commission, responsible for assessing the projects, did not release any details of the investment arrangements.

Provincial officials, however, are happy to get the money, whether it comes from Chinese investors or foreign cash.

"We need a huge amount of capital, both from domestic and foreign investors," said Cao.

The announcement of the massive investment plan was another sign of the central government's commitment to breath new life into Northeast China's struggling economy.

By the end of last year, the central government had agreed to set up a special national task force to deal with the issue.

The task force will likely work out of the National Development and Reform Commission.

The investment plan and the central government's decision to form the new task force follow the landmark decision of last year's 16th National Congress of the Communist Party of China to put revitalizing the northeast at the top of the government agenda.

The Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China recently called for accelerated efforts to revitalize the old northeast industrial bases, calling it a long-term and difficult task.

The three northeast provinces of Heilongjiang, Liaoning and Jilin are known as the "industrial cradle of China." They played a vital role in the country's industrial development from the 1950s to the early 1970s.

However, many of the traditional industrial firms have been struggling since the country began opening up its market more than two decades ago.

The proportion of the region's industrial output value to the national total has dropped to 9 per cent from 17 per cent. Some money-losing State industries were closed after laying off large numbers of workers.

Close