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Guangdong sets 4 trillion yuan GDP target

By Dai Yan (chinadaily.com.cn)
Updated: 2007-05-22 17:51

Guangdong Province's gross domestic product (GDP) is expected to exceed four trillion yuan (US$521.7 billion) by 2011 and overtake Taiwan Province's by the end of the year, according to a top official from the provincial government.

In the next five years, Guangdong will also cut industry energy consumption by 16 percent and the major pollutant emissions by 15 percent, said Zhang Dejiang, general secretary of the Guangdong Provincial Party Committee.

The GDP of the rapidly developing province is expected to surpass Taiwan's GDP of 2.77 trillion yuan in 2006. Guangdong's GDP reached 2.59 trillion yuan in 2006, doubling the 2001 figure and accounted for one-eighth of the country's total. The GDP per capita in Guangdong was 28,000 yuan, up 80 percent from 2001. Its financial income topped 500 billion yuan in the same year, an increase of 100 percent compared with five years earlier.

Guangdong's foreign trade volume rose to US$527.21 billion in 2006 from US$176.4 billion in 2001. Its general trade export value jumped to US$80 billion, up 50 percent and overtaking Zhejiang as the country's largest general trade exporter."

The province will continue to adjust its economic structure, focus on developing its hi-tech industry, advanced manufacturing industry and service industry. The government will encourage research on biology, environmental protection, new material and new energy, raise independent research and development ability of the auto industry, speed up building petrochemical and steel bases, and strengthen infrastructure construction including transportation, energy and information. The textiles, food and building material industry will make profits from building the brand, not from quantity.

Zhang stressed Guangdong's economic development should depend more on innovation. The province will build a technology property right trading market and governmental purchase system for innovative products.