Shenyang county aiming to be nation's 'light aircraft capital'

Newlyweds pose on a plane at the wedding ceremony which held at the closing day of the AOPA-China Fly-In 2013 air show in Faku Caihu airport in Shenyang, northeast Chinas Liaoning province, Sept 22, 2013. [Photo/dfic.cn]

"China has huge market demand for light aircraft, and the development of the aircraft production industry will also stimulate other industries, such as financial services, civil aviation and aviation logistics," Bai said.

"General aviation is the foundation of a country's aviation industry. As a new, burgeoning industry in China, it plays an important role in consolidating national defense and promoting economic development, but we still lag some distance behind many other countries, especially in training," said Liu Yi, China's longest-serving pilot and chief pilot at the Liaoning Academy of General Aviation.

Bai agreed, saying: "The industry started relatively late in China. We must speed up the pace of developing experts and attach more importance to proprietary intellectual property research and development, design and production."

The Faku General Aviation Base became the country's experimental low-altitude airspace (flying heights lower than 1,000 meters) aviation service station in September 2010. Faku's experience will serve as the model for China's other general aviation bases.

The experimental base status gives Faku flexibility.

"Generally, a pilot must submit low-altitude flight plans to the aviation authorities days or even a week ahead of time. But at our base, we only need to report plans two hours before a flight," said Feng Shouquan, Party chief of Faku county. The base has four parts: R&D, manufacturing, training and leisure tourism, he said.

Faku has been hosting the Faku Flight International Conference for the past two years. It's one of the top three air shows in China. The flight international conference has invited aerobatic pilots from more than 20 countries including the US, Canada, Britain and South Africa.

The third Faku Flight International Conference will be held from Aug 27 to 31.

Liu Ce contributed to the story.

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