Favorable policies, business climate big draw for skilled staff

The government of Xiamen's Haicang district is paying equal attention to the development of industry and attracting human resources, officials said.

They said it believes industries with supportive government policies and a favorable business climate will have a huge appeal for skilled workers, while the integration of talented staff will play an important role in boosting the development of those industries in return.

Home to Fujian province's only national-level biomedical demonstration area, Haicang is developing the biomedicine industry as a strategic driving force for its local economic growth. It is innovating systems to attract, foster and serve high-quality human resources in this field.

Officials said that so far, the district has attracted to it more than 3,000 senior biomedical researchers and technicians, and the benefits have become evident.

In 2016, the output value of Haicang's biomedicine industry was nearly 17 billion yuan ($2.57 billion).

The district has launched a series of policies and guidelines to accelerate the development of the industry.

It has issued favorable policies to offer experienced, well-trained workers diverse services ranging from those related to work to those linked to the home and security.

These high-level personnel enjoy free health checkups, and their spouses also enjoy supportive policies such as living allowances. Since 2012, the government has spent a total of 180 million yuan on funding those services.

Many local biomedical companies have benefited from the talent-related policies. In 2013, Amoytop Biotech recruited Lu Jianming, a senior biomedicine scientist, to serve as the director of the company's research and development projects.

The company ranked No 1 worldwide in terms of its market share of gene tumor diagnostic products for three consecutive years, after it developed a research team led by a medical PhD Zhu Guanshan.

Haicang has organized a raft of biomedicine summits, forums and innovation and entrepreneurship competitions to increase the influence of its biomedicine industry.

Last year, the district invited 19 foreign senior experts from nine countries including the United States, Russia, Japan and Italy, via the national Recruitment Program of Global Experts, to visit local biomedical companies and startups to provide technological guidance.

Haicang invested nearly 1 billion yuan to build a biomedicine industry zone covering an area of 10 million square meters.

The zone is home to 30 research and public service centers, which provide about 90,000 services. It has more than 18,000 staff members, including 75 leading experts and 3,000 workers with senior technical titles.

The district also works with local commercial banks and the Xiamen Cross-Straits Equity Exchange Center to organize matchmaking events for biomedical companies, as well as project road shows and financial training courses.

The combined estimated value of its 97 local biomedical companies has almost reached 70 billion yuan.

haonan@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 12/13/2017 page10)