Northeast China boasts the "comparative advantages and
conditions" for the country's fourth biggest regional economy only
after the Pearl river delta, the Yangtze river delta and areas
around the Bohai sea, a senior economic official said Tuesday.
Song Xiaowu, deputy director of the State Council's office of
northeast China revitalization, said the region "has begun to
recover," at a press conference for the first blue-paper book on
the development of northeast China.
He cited the region's increases of economic output, overall
investment, foreign capital and residents' income, which all
surpassed the national average in recent years.
Urban residents in northeast China, covering the provinces of
Liaoning, Jilin and Heilongjiang, enjoyed a 38 percent surge on
year in 2005 income, creating favorable conditions for consumer
spending, while materialized foreign investment soared 87.7 percent
to US$6.26 billion last year.
Bao Zhendong, president of the Liaoning Academy of Social
Sciences, agreed, saying "the growth in northeast China is on track
to accelerate."
Northeast China's per capita gross domestic product, however,
made up only one third of that of the Pearl river delta in south
China in 2004, government figures show.
Song said the key to the northeast China success lies in turning
an old rustbelt into a state-of-the-art and liberalized industrial
base.
The region now accounts for 40 percent of China's crude oil
output, half of its timber production and a quarter of the
country's auto output, and analysts agree it serves as a window for
China's opening to northeast Asia.
(Xinhua News Agency November 15, 2006)