Experience has shown that sound planning of the layout of industrial sectors is conducive to steady economic development of the city, said Chen Deming, Party secretary of the Suzhou Communist Committee.
Located in the affluent Yangtze River Delta in East China's Jiangsu Province, Suzhou is one of the most economically developed cities in the country. Its economy has grown fast since the early 1990s. Its gross domestic product (GDP) has since ranked amongst China's top 10 cities, reaching 176 billion yuan (US$22 billion) last year.
The success of the city's economic construction is largely attributed to the reasonable geographical distribution of different industrial sectors.
"While making the blueprint of the economic development, we carefully investigated the city's industrial structure and the market demand to map out the layout of various industrial sectors," he said.
According to their characteristics, four distinctive locations have been formed for different industries.
Taking advantage of the convenient airport transportation routes in Shanghai, many high-tech industries, such as electronics, biochemistry and new materials, have been built in an area adjacent to Shanghai to ensure the prompt shipment of products to their overseas destinations.
The metallurgy, building material, papermaking and petrochemical industries are concentrated along the Yangtze to make use of the water route for transportation of heavy products and reduce the productive cost.
Suzhou has also tapped its rich tourism resources by building first-class leisure and sightseeing facilities around Taihu Lake. After years of development, tourism has now become a pillar industry in the city and has boosted the growth of the service industry and other sectors.
Statistics show that the city received 17.5 million domestic and overseas tourists last year, yielding a revenue of 17.1 billion yuan (US$2.1 billion), making up nearly 10 percent of the city's GDP.
Another important player in the city's economic development is the township and village enterprises that started booming in the early 1980s and has been gaining momentum ever since. Now, many of these small- and medium-sized enterprises have become producers of auxiliary parts for domestic and transnational companies.
"This industrial layout has proven to be favorable for the city's overall economic development," Chen said.
(China Daily May 8, 2002)
