Six More Free Trade Zones Approved
Aug 30-2019
On August 26th, China's State Council gave the go-ahead to six new Free Trade Trial Zones in the six provinces of Shandong, Jiangsu, Guangxi, Hebei, Yunnan and Heilongjiang. In an exclusive media interview, Prof. Yu Miaojie believed that the master plan for these new Zones benefits from the experiences of the Shanghai Free Trade Zone, the first of its kind in China. He’s also the Party Secretary of NSD.
Commonalities aside, the six new Zones are positioned and tasked differently. Shandong will focus on high-quality development of marine economy and regional economic cooperation between China, Japan and South Korea. Guangxi will build international land and maritime trade channels with the ASEAN countries and turn itself into an important gateway for the Belt and Road. Hebei will drive high-quality growth of the Xiong’an New Area and the aligned development of Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei. Jiangsu has a broad mandate to actively serve national strategies.
Prof. Yu said that such differentiations based on local characteristics are very important. On the macro-level, China's opening-up has been carried out in an orderly manner and the FTZs network – previously 12 and all in eastern regions – is now extended from the north to the south.
According to the master plan, the new Zones should speed up the transformation of government functions, deepen investment-related reforms, promote trade transformation and upgrading, as well as deepen the opening up and innovation in the financial industry, all of which can be traced back to Shanghai Free Trade Zone. Prof. Yu said that more than just attracting FDI, the addition of FTZs will play an instrumental role in shaping China’s new stage of reform and opening up.
