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The Yangtze River Delta in east China would have developed much faster if the current regional division had been removed.
This is a view shared in common among many deputies to the 10th National People's Congress and members of the 10th National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference.
The delta, embracing Shanghai Municipality, Zhejiang and Jiangsu provinces, contributes to 22.1 percent of the country's GDP, 24.5 percent of national revenue and 28.5 percent of the total foreign trade, although it has only 2.2 percent of the country's land area and 10.4 percent of the population.
However, administrative division has segmented the delta and therefore restricted the development of the region as a whole. An example is the choice of pillar industries by different cities. There are 15 cities in this region and 11 have chosen vehicle parts as their pillar industries, eight have chosen petro-chemicalindustry and 12 have opted for telecommunications industry, leading to serious overlapping in construction.
In addition, some trans-regional enterprises are subjecting to different administrative charges and the water and power supply and roads in the junctures of different regions are in a state of segmentation.
Deputy Chen Derong, mayor of Jiaxing City, said that the Yangtze River Delta has widely been acknowledged as the world's sixth largest metropolitan and one of the regions with the most vigorous development, and the total GDP in this region has reached the level of a standard international economic center.
"The movement of production factors among different cities is seriously impeded by administrative segmentation," he said.
Xi Jinping, secretary of the Zhejiang provincial CPC committee, said that economic integration of the Yangtze River Delta will give the competitive edge to the region, but without reasonable regional planning, repetition in project construction will be inevitable.
"All divisions and restrictions should be removed to promote regional economic integration," he said.
Deputy to the NPC and Mayor of Zhenjiang City Shi Heping said that in an area of less than 100,000 square kilometers, more than half of the economically developed counties of the country are concentrated and there are nearly 100 industrial parks each with an industrial output value of more than 10 billion yuan and nearly 1000 giant enterprises. The cluster of cities has caught worldwide attention.
"All the regional segmentation in the way of development should be removed so that different areas may share resources," he said.
Member of the CPPCC Chen Shouyi urged the use of the "visible hand" of the government to form a mechanism that will coordinate the development in the whole of the Yangtze River Delta.
Xi Jinping proposed across-the-board cooperation among Shanghai, Zhejiang and Jiangsu that will cover infrastructure, division of labor in industry, tourism resources development and opening up of the market, environmental protection, science and technology, information, education and personnel.
(Xinhua News Agency March 13, 2003)
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