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Shanghai mayor vows to raise growth quality at city’s annual session

By Wang Yanlin | January 19, 2014, Sunday | Online Edition

Shanghai will focus on reform and opening-up this year with all-out efforts on key projects like the free trade zone to raise the city’s growth quality while keep the development pace steady, Shanghai Mayor Yang Xiong said today.

The city targets an economic growth rate of 7.5 percent this year, the same as the goal set for 2013, and compared with last year’s expected growth rate of 7.7 percent, Yang said in a speech on government work at the opening of the annual session of the Shanghai People’s Congress.

“Shanghai will pursue innovation-driven growth as well as economic transform and upgrading,” Yang said. “We will drive reform in all fields and focus on improving the quality and efficiency of economic development through adjusting economic structure, improving people’s livelihood and promoting social harmony as well as stability.”

Shanghai will continue to be a “role model” in building an upgrade version of the Chinese economy, Yang said, pledging to make all-out efforts to construct the China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone, a major initiative inaugurated in September of last year to promote China’s reform and opening-up under new conditions.

This year’s priority in building the free trade zone will be given to form a framework that is aligned with international trade and investment norms. The city will seek “substantive progress” in reforms, including cross-border settlement in the yuan, its convertibility under the capital account and interest rate liberalization in a bid to serve the city’s purpose of being a “pioneer” in the national reform and opening-up drive.

Shanghai will revise the negative list in a timely manner and take out other innovations concerning trade administration in the zone such as a model of classified supervision based on the status of goods, Yang said.

To become a global financial center and boost the services sector, the city will work on the launch of crude oil futures and the insurance exchange, Yang said. Meanwhile, more efforts will be made on attracting functional departments of financial institutions like their regional headquarters and support the development of new business formats like Internet banking.

The city will also push forward the upgrading of the manufacturing sector, committed to moving the strategic emerging industries up the value chain with the market playing a bigger role.

To treat the deteriorating environment, Shanghai will step up resource conservation and environmental protection through promoting the use of clean energy like wind and solar power, calling for more distributed energy supply as well as new energy vehicles, Yang said.

The investment in environment protection will be maintained at around 3 percent of the city’s economic output.

“We will pay more attention to the atmospheric environment, especially the treatment of PM2.5,” Yang said. About 70,000 pollutant vehicles will retire this year, and the treatment of volatile organic compounds and flying dusts will get strengthened.

To become a better city, Shanghai will continue to improve its infrastructure. The city will break ground on metro lines with a total length of 103 kilometers this year, and the ongoing construction of 65 kilometers of metro lines will be accelerated.

The city will also launch the fourth phase of the Yangshan Deep Water Port project, Shanghai-Nantong Railway Line, while a re-developed Expo Park will start to take shape. The city will gear up for the operation of the Disney project, Yang said.

This year, Shanghai will try to create 500,000 new jobs with priorities given to college graduates, the youth and people job placement difficulties. It also targets helping 10,000 people to successfully start their businesses.

To improve people’s well-being, Shanghai plans to build and renovate 55,000 subsidized housing units this year, and further deepen reforms in education and healthcare, Yang said.

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