East China’s Jiangsu province has reported more coordinated regional development and stronger economic strength since the opening of the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China in 2012, according to a press conference held Tuesday by the provincial information office.
Implementing the regional coordinated development strategy is one of the major national strategies in the new era. Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, Jiangsu has formulated the principle of classified guidance on the leadership of southern Jiangsu, the rise of central Jiangsu, and the catch-up of northern Jiangsu by establishing and improving a new mechanism for coordinated regional development so as to have further narrowed the regional development gap.
In 2021, the total economic output of central and northern Jiangsu accounted for 47.3% of the province's total, an increase of 7.2 percentage points over 2012.
The integrated development of the Yangtze River Delta is a matter of great concern to the overall development of Jiangsu.
In the coordinated development of the Yangtze River Delta, Jiangsu has continued to make efforts in various fields such as industrial innovation, infrastructure, regional markets, green development, and public services.
Jiangsu is presently speeding up the construction of the North Yangtze River high-speed railway and the Nantong-Suzhou-Jiaxing-Ningbo railway, and 6 of the 11 inter-provincial dead-end highways have been put into operation.
In the meantime, Jiangsu has implemented 27 major projects in key core technologies and achieved 18 major achievements.
The Yangtze River Delta Ecological and Green Integrated Development Demonstration Zone has produced 73 institutional innovations that can be replicated and promoted in other parts of the country.
Jiangsu has also continued to promote the Yangtze River City Cluster, the strategy of developing Xuzhou into a central city of the Huaihai Economic Zone, and the "1+3" key functional zone strategy of the Jianghuai Ecological Economic Zone.
Jiangsu has built 17 Yangtze River channels with 8 Yangtze River channels under construction. The output value of offshore engineering equipment accounts for one-fourth of the country's total, and the installed capacity of offshore wind power ranks first in the country. The Pan'an Lake coal mining subsidence treatment project has become a national model for the green development of resource-based cities.
Over the past decade, Jiangsu has continued to promote the transfer of industry, finance, technology and talents from southern Jiangsu to northern Jiangsu to have enhanced the driving force for the development of northern Jiangsu. At the same time, Jiangsu accelerated the construction of high-speed rail infrastructure in northern Jiangsu and built industrial parks through south-north collaboration.
Statistics show that in 2021, the per capita GDP gap between southern Jiangsu and northern Jiangsu narrowed from 2.48 times in 2012 to less than 2 times.
The per capita income of urban residents and rural residents in northern Jiangsu was 1.97 times and 2.21 times that of 2012, indicating the accelerated pace of economic and social development in northern Jiangsu.
