The 12th Symposium on Chinese Scholars and Shanghai Development in the 21st Century with the theme of "Eyeing the Future: Lingang Special Area" kicked off in Shanghai yesterday. Experts, scholars and government officials gave their opinions on the future development of the Lingang Special Area. They believe that Lingang should serve the national strategy and be a trailblazer in terms of industrial, financial and talent policies.

Core technology breakthroughs highlighted in industrial innovation

Industrial development is an important strategic mission of the development of the Lingang Special Area. A batch of data released at the seminar impressed the experts: since the Lingang Special Area was unveiled, 752 projects have been signed, with an overall investment of 430 billion yuan.  5 municipal-level industrial parks have been successfully accredited. In the Yangshan Special Comprehensive Free Trade Zone, 128 new enterprises have been established since this year, with a year-on-year growth of 327%, and the registered capital of domestic enterprises has reached 3.727 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 1,317%.

"For the industrial development, our goal is very clear, that is to create a world-class industrial cluster belt," said Zhang Tong, director of the High-tech Industry and Sci-tech innovation Department of the Management Committee of Lingang Special Area. He also said that the Lingang Special Area has clearly defined a "7 + 5 + 4" innovative industrial system, focusing on the development of cutting-edge industries such as integrated circuits, artificial intelligence, biomedicine, aerospace, intelligent new energy vehicles, high-end equipment and green manufacturing. Lingang is striving to expand its frontier industries to a scale of 600 billion yuan by 2025.

“In the future, we should accelerate the breakthrough of key core technologies, accelerate the fostering and gathering of world-class "hard technology" [key and core technology that requires long-term research and development and continuous efforts and investment) enterprises, and benchmark ourselves to the highest industrial standards, and at the same time increase and strengthen the industrial capacity and scale,” Zhang Tong said.

Support high quality development with financial reform

In terms of the enhancement of the global financial resources allocation function, the Lingang Special Area has launched 123 financial institutions, with the scale of registered funds exceeding 264 billion yuan. Xie Dong, head of Shanghai's local Financial Supervision and Administration Bureau, said that promoting the financial development of the Lingang Special Area will further support the development of Shanghai towards an international financial center and improve the overall competitiveness and service level.

Financial trail blazing has always been an important part of the development of the Lingang Special Area. When it comes to increasing financial stress testing, the Lingang Special Area took the lead in implementing innovative measures such as the facilitation of cross-border RMB settlement for high-quality enterprises and cross-border transfer of domestic trade and financing assets, Xie Dong said. At present, these measures have all borne fruit and effectively supported the high-quality economic development.

"Based on the needs of epidemic prevention and control and economic and social development, we will, when the time is right, promote innovative measures such as RMB settlement facilitation for high-quality enterprises across the whole city, which will further highlight the pilot and demonstration role of Lingang Special Area in the city’s development towards being an international financial center," Xie Dong said.

He also said that the next step will be to improve the four systems of the financial market, products, institutions and infrastructure, and implement higher-level measures for investment and trade liberalization and facilitation, including carrying out pilot reform projects to simplify foreign debt registration, converting bank authenticity review from pre-review to post-review, and developing offshore RMB transactions.

Actively integrate into Global Talent Network

"Some people say we are away from downtown, but we are very close to the world!" joked Wu Wei, a member of the Party Working Committee and deputy director of the Management Committee of Lingang Special Area. How to attract more outstanding talent from all over the world became a hot topic in the meeting.

By 2035, the planned permanent population of the area will reach 2.5 million. The population structure is characterized by youth, internationalization, high educational background and mobility. However, there is still a wide gap between the planned and actual number.

A good environment and infrastructure are key to attracting talent. “The Lingang Special Area is characterized by openness and innovation, intelligent ecology, integration of industry and city, and is therefore suitable for both working and living," said Wu Wei, adding that there are now 7 universities, 21 primary and secondary schools and 14 kindergartens, and development of other public facilities such as medical centers and transportation is also accelerating.