Wenzhou

'Most Dynamic City'

By Zhang Zhao (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-06-19 07:18

UN organization cites favorable climate to start new business

Southeast China's Wenzhou has been named one of the "Globe's Most Dynamic Cities" by the United Nations Industrial Development Organization as a place for starting new business and industries.

Wenzhou was a prosperous foreign treaty port, and is still one of the vital ports lying between the Yangtze River Delta and the Pearl River Delta. It is also one of the most important cities in the Economic Zone on the West Coast of the Taiwan Straits and one of the three most important cities in Zhejiang province.

The Wenzhou government combined the national opening up policy with its local practices. By leading the way in promoting market-oriented reforms and developing a private economy, the city created the "Wenzhou Economic Model", which features a flexible system and continuous innovation, which has inspired the modernization drive in China.

The city achieved 252.8 billion yuan ($37 billion) in GDP in 2009, an 8.5 percent year-on-year increase, with its gross fiscal revenue amounting to 36.1 billion yuan, up 6.2 percent. The annual per capita disposable income for urban residents and the net per capita income for rural residents both increased by 7.1 percent, reaching 28,021 yuan and 10,100 yuan respectively.

As the cradle of China's private economy, Wenzhou has over 140,000 private enterprises, 11 of which have been listed among China's Top 500 Competitive Private Enterprises.

Wenzhou has developed many industries, including clothes and shoes making, low voltage electric apparatus, pumps and valves and motor parts, along with some other emerging industries, including electrical applicants and shipbuilding.

Located away from the center of the political and economic stage, the Wenzhou people are more independent, self-reliant, and generally more business-oriented than in other parts of China. Now over 1.7 million of Wenzhou's entrepreneurs are doing business in every corner of China, and another 600,000 have started businesses in more than 100 countries and regions around the world.

(China Daily 06/19/2010 page12)