Nanning: Despite the impact of the global economic crisis, South China's Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region achieved rapid economic development in 2009 thanks to the region's enormous efforts to develop the free trade area (FTA) with its Southeast Asian neighbors and robust government investment.

Guangxi's economy grew 13.9 percent to reach 770 billion yuan in 2009, far higher than the national economic growth of 8.7 percent, ranking fifth nationwide in terms of economic growth.

Reeling from the global economic crisis, Guangxi's foreign trade substantially shrank in early 2009 with nearly 1,000 companies suspending or half suspending production, Ma said.

In the first 10 months of 2009 Guangxi's foreign trade decreased by 7.8 percent, according to Guangxi Statistics Bureau.

However, huge government investment helped buck the downward trend. In 2009, the Guangxi regional government pumped a total of 571 billion yuan in fixed assets investment, exceeding the total from 2001 to 2005. The figure has more than doubled the level of the previous year and marked the biggest year-on-year increase in the past 16 years.

As a result, Guangxi's imports and exports in 2009 as a whole rose 7.3 percent to $14.21 billion, the second-fastest growth in China, according to the government work report. Exports grew 13.9 percent, the fastest growth nationwide.

Record bank lending also help resisted the economic downside. Last year banks extended new loans worth 225 billion yuan, an increase of 137.5 percent year on year, the second-fastest growth in China.

Much of the investment went to the construction of infrastructures including ports and logistics centers to boost regional economic and trade cooperation with members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

New port zones have been completed and put into operation in Qinzhou and Beihai, two important port cities in the Beibu Bay economic zone, which also includes Nanning and another port city Fangchenggang.

In 2009, the economic zone experienced 15.9 percent growth in gross output, making it one of the fastest growing regions in China, according to the government work report.

The China-ASEAN FTA , expected to be the third-largest free trade zone in the world in terms of total trade volume, was inaugurated on the first day of 2010.

It has the largest population among all FTA in the world and is also the largest among developing countries.

Guangxi, one of China's five autonomous regions and a region hosting the largest population of ethnic minority groups in the country, expects to realize 12 percent economic growth in 2010, helped by its planned investment of 800 billion yuan, Ma said.

"Guangxi will focus on boosting the development of fourteen 100-billion-yuan industries including autos, petrol-chemicals, electronic information, pharmaceuticals and ship building, while developing four new industries: new materials, new energy, environmental protection and the sea industry," the Guangxi chairman said.