Ding Xudong, Party secretary of Jinyang New District, says cities such as Guiyang will play a more important role in driving the national economy. HU HAIYAN / CHINA DAILY

Ding Xudong, an energetic and jaunty fi gure, believes China's inner regions will be the engines of growth of China's economy over the next generation.

The 52-year-old is Party secretary of Jinyang New District, a 307-squarekilometer area adjunct to the southwestern city of Guiyang.

The money poured into the area is behind the city's growth rate of 17.1 percent last year, almost double the national average and one of the highest in the whole of China.

"I believe cities like Guiyang and other areas in the west of China will become more and more important in driving the national economy," he says.

Ding, who was speaking in his o= ces in Century City in central Guiyang, says he is keen to attract investment from Europe and the United States into the new city district. "We are trying to make Jinyang an attractive investment destination, especially for foreign investment," he says.

"The fast growth we have experienced has already attracted a number of investors and we would like to see more."

Work began on the new district after it was o= cially launched in 2001, and since then 140 billion yuan ($22 billion, 17.7 billion euros) has been invested there, with a further 40 billion yuan likely to be spent this year.

Ding says it was not possible to develop Guiyang by just expanding the old city and that building what was in eA ect a new second city was the only way forward. A number of other Chinese cities have also followed such schemes.

"The original city of Guiyang just was not able to support the pace of development of Guiyang. The city government therefore chose to develop a new city," he says.

The new district includes the Guiyang International Exhibition and Convention Center, which opened last year, the 52,000-seater Guiyang Olympic Sports Center and Century Town, a huge residential complex of 40,000 homes.

It also includes the China West Technology Park, a sizeable high-tech park and the Guiyang Central High Speed Rail Station, from which passengers will be able to reach Chongqing by the 300-kph bullet train in 1 hour and 30 minutes and Guangzhou in just 3 hours by 2014.

Revenue generated in the area was only 700 million yuan during the period from 2001 to 2008 but it is expected to hit 3.8 billion yuan this year.

Ding, who speaks in a fast, almost machine-gun-like Guizhou dialect, dismisses any suggestion that the new district is excessive spending and will serve only to rack up local government debt.

"I think if you look at the southwestern and western regions of China, the debts are aA ordable," he says.

"It is important to spend the money because it is vital to improve infrastructure since this will attract more investment from outside. I think if we relied on fi scal revenue and didn't raise any debt, the gap between the east and west of China would just become larger and larger."