Lin-gang targets 7.5% annual GDP growth, three 100b yuan industrial clusters by 2030

Lin-gang Special Area in Pudong, a part of the China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone, will aim for an average annual GDP growth rate of 7.5 percent by 2030, according to the area's 15th Five-Year Plan (2026-30) released by the municipal government at the end of July.

Frontier industrial clusters, including integrated circuits, civil aviation, high-end equipment, intelligent vehicles and the digital economy, will serve as the major growth engines. Industrial clusters of IC, intelligent vehicles and high-end manufacturing should see their respective value exceeding 100 billion yuan ($14.8 billion) by 2030, the newly released plan said.

Supply chain security and resilience have been underscored regarding the development of the civil aviation industry. More efforts should be made to boost the production ramp-up of the homegrown C919 passenger jet and support the development and certification of the C929. Key manufacturing links will center on large fuselage sections, composite materials, avionics systems and engines.

The development of high-bypass-ratio turbofan engines and nacelles will be advanced, while the airworthiness certification of domestically produced engines and their integration into aircraft will be expedited, the plan said.

As a pioneering demonstration zone for China's high-standard opening-up and stress testing, Lin-gang should strive for more institutional innovations in the upcoming five years, especially in areas of cross-border data flows, cross-border finance, offshore finance, high-caliber shipping services, new bonded business models, and offshore science and technology innovation.

At this year's Lujiazui Forum held in June, six central government ministries jointly released an action plan for developing offshore finance in Shanghai. Responding to this, the municipal government has underlined in Lin-gang's next five-year plan that offshore trade financial services will be prioritized, especially those based on commodity trading.

New bonded business models will be expanded and strengthened in Lin-gang, the new plan said. Efforts will be made to promote policies that allow logistics and processing activities in port areas while restrictions on cargo storage duration are expected to be removed. Bonded maintenance will be scaled up through greater innovation. The area will also explore introducing a negative-list management approach for bonded maintenance products.

Lin-gang should also step up its efforts to perfect the full-chain innovation system encompassing basic research, technological breakthroughs, achievement commercialization and business incubation. This will foster more "zero-to-one" original breakthroughs and accelerate the "one-to-N" industrialization process, according to the plan.