Investment: The key to Beijing’s economic development

The Municipal Investment Promotion Conference was held in Beijing on Feb 27. Gou Zhongwen, vice-mayor of Beijing, attended the conference and delivered a speech. The main tasks of the conference were to summarize the municipal investment works in 2012 and to study and deploy the tasks in 2013.

Zhou Weimin, the director general of the Beijing Investment Promotion Bureau, delivered a report on how “to make investment play a key role in Beijing’s rapid economic development” at the conference.

In 2012, the Beijing Investment Promotion Bureau promoted over 1,000 projects for the first time, attaining a year-on-year growth of 43 percent. It promoted 466 foreign investment projects.

The Beijing Municipal Investment Promotion Bureau promoted 623 domestic investment projects in 2012, 313 of them have completed registration. Registered capital rose 53 percent year-on-year to 26.6 billion yuan ($4.29 billion). The number of main projects increased 48 percent to 328. The grassroots investment promotion organizations of every district and county have promoted 776 major projects, 690 of them are domestic investment projects involving capital of 435.4 billion yuan with registered capital of 141.8 billion yuan. The remaining 86 are foreign investment projects with total capital of $15 billion and FDI of $3.1 billion.

In addition, the investors network has been extended to include eight major categories: State-owned enterprises, large-scale private enterprises, multinational companies, equity investment institutions, leading and listed enterprises, high-growth innovative enterprises, foreign chambers of commerce and in-Beijing chambers of commerce of other provinces and cities as well as their key members and investment intermediaries.

Beijing will attend a series of domestic and foreign investment promotion events this year, including the Beijing-Hong Kong Economic Cooperation Symposium, Beijing Investment Fair and Macworld iWorld Asia. The Beijing Investment Promotion Bureau will make full use of these events to introduce its investment climate, preferential investment policies, business opportunities, and publishing and projects cooperation to improve pertinence, professionalism, internationalism and effectiveness.

“Beijing’s economic development is not only of great importance to its role as a capital and global city with Chinese characteristics, it is also the weather vane of China’s economy and a showcase of China’s economy and social development for the world. Maintaining smooth economic development is very crucial as this is the first year of the 18th National Congress of the CPC,” said Mr. Gou, the vice-mayor.

Participants in the conference included the directors of governmental investment promotion organizations, foreign investment enterprise associations, foreign chambers of commerce in Beijing, in-Beijing chambers of commerce of other provinces and cities, investment intermediaries, and executives of foreign companies.