Guangdong targets $75 billion in foreign investment

Guangdong province aims to attract more than $75 billion in foreign investment from 2013 to 2015, according to guidelines released by the provincial government.

The guidelines emphasized the service, emerging innovative and the advanced manufacturing industries.

It outlined that foreign investment in the service industry is set to exceed 45 percent of the total by 2015.

Investment from Europe and the United States is also set to increase, accounting for 16 percent of total foreign investment by the end of 2013, 18 percent by 2014 and more than 20 percent by 2015.

Guangdong, a key manufacturing base, has seen a thinning influx of overseas funds because of rising labor and land costs.

Zhao Yufang, vice-governor of Guangdong, has been calling for a boost to foreign trade in the past six months in major cities in the province.

Guangdong faces a stark imbalance in economic growth in different regions, said Cheng Sanjian, an expert in the development of the Pearl River region.

Most foreign investment goes to well-developed regions, such as Guangzhou and Shenzhen in the Pearl River Delta Region. The vast western area has few advantages apart from cheap land and labor, said Cheng.