New bridge, government policies, link Pingtan to world

Improved transportation just part of progress on island achieved over four decades of reform and opening-up, Hao Nan reports.

Pingtan, an island county in East China's Fujian province, used to suffer from a development bottleneck due to poor transportation. But now, that situation is changing rapidly, as the local government has ramped up its efforts to build a comprehensive transport system, especially since the establishment of the Pingtan Comprehensive Pilot Zone in 2010.

The Pingtan Haixia Rail-Road Bridge is the latest breakthrough the county has made in improving its transportation.

The project, now under construction, is China's first cross-sea rail-road bridge and also the most difficult one to build in the country to date. The 16-kilometer-long bridge has two layers, with the upper level carrying a six-lane highway running at a maximum speed of 100 km per hour, and the lower bearing a double-track railway, with a maximum speed of 200 km per hour.

Linking Pingtan with Fuzhou, capital city of Fujian province, the bridge is expected to greatly shorten the traffic time between the two areas. The last main tower of the bridge was capped in June, and the overall construction is scheduled to be completed in October 2019.

The cross-sea link is also an integral part of the Fuzhou-Pingtan railway.

The railway now under construction stretches about 88 km, and it's intended to support the construction of the Binhai New City in Fuzhou - a cluster for emerging industries including big data and cloud computing - as well as helping to promote the opening up of the Pingtan Comprehensive Pilot Zone. When the railway is put into operation, it will take only half an hour to travel between Pingtan and Fuzhou.

Pingtan is also home to the Strait Bridge, which currently serves as the only overland entrance and exit for the island, together with its neighboring auxiliary bridge. Before the opening of the bridge in late 2010, a ship was required for transportation between Pingtan and the rest of China.

The improved transportation is just the tip of an iceberg of the county's progress made during the past 40 years of reform and opening-up. Other achievements have also been witnessed in such fields as tourism, finance, exhibition, shipping logistics, wind power and rural revitalization.

Situated between Taiwan and Haitan straits, Pingtan is gifted with rich, stable wind resources, which provide a favorable condition for its development in green power. The Changjiang'ao wind power farm is the first commercialized project of its kind in Pingtan, which has provided much of the island's clean energy.

The first phase of the Changjiang'ao project, which consisted of 10 wind power generating units, was put into use in 2000. Seven years later, the second phase started operation, generating a total of 500 million kilowatt-hours of electricity in three years.

Due to its limited land resources, Pingtan now has shifted its focus to the construction of offshore wind power farms, and plans to pour more resources into maritime wind power equipment manufacturing and services to strengthen the industrial chain.

Shipping logistics is another high priority for the Pingtan government. To further promote industrial development, the administrative committee of Pingtan Comprehensive Pilot Zone issued three related opinions in 2014 and 2015.

A year later, the committee improved these three documents and integrated them into one, which included a series of new preferential policies such as tonnage-related subsidies and a tax refund policy, and the establishment of Pingtan's maritime safety administration.

Benefiting from these policies, the shipping logistics sector has developed rapidly in Pingtan. The number of shipping logistics companies registered in the county increased from eight in 2014 to the current 76, with total dead weight metric tons rising from 130,000 to 2.83 million.

Since last year, Pingtan has tried to upgrade the development pattern of the industry by combining it with the experimental area's logistics, aiming to create a shipping and logistics industrial platform featuring low costs, convenient customs clearance, on-time delivery and preferential policies.

In addition to transportation and industries, the Pingtan government also emphasizes the improvement of people's livelihoods and is striving to realize rural revitalization.

To meet local residents' higher demands for their shopping environment, for example, Pingtan is constructing and rebuilding five supermarkets specializing in agricultural trade. They will be equipped with comprehensive facilities and will offer a clean environment and standardized management.

In terms of rural revitalization, Beigang village, which is located in northeastern Pingtan's Liushui town, is a successful example of this endeavor. Transformed from an obscure fishing village, Beigang has now become a hot tourist destination to experience cross-Straits cultural and creative projects.

The village's natural beauty, and its ancient, traditional stone folk dwellings, have also captivated numerous visitors from China and abroad.

The Rock Can Sing art zone is a famous project based on some of the village's rock houses. The zone covers accommodation, live music, a restaurant, a cafe and a souvenir store. Currently, a total of 10 young people from the Chinese mainland and Taiwan, including Taiwan resident Lin I-chen and her boyfriend Liao Che-wei, work at the art project.

Contact the writer at haonan@chinadaily.com.cn

County plans more reform, opening-up

Pingtan recently issued a program to further deepen reform and opening-up in its free trade area, part of the China (Fujian) Pilot Free Trade Zone, and made new deployments to boost the county's cross-Straits economic and cultural exchanges.

By 2020, the Pingtan free trade zone will establish a management mechanism that is in line with the international investment and trade rules, as well as create a legalized, international and convenient business environment, build a cross-Straits integrated development demonstration area, constructing a comprehensive reform pilot zone featuring the integration of openness and innovation, and transform itself into a livable international tourist island, according to the program. The free trade zone will continue to streamline its administrative approvals and improve related services, making them more standard and transparent. The use of online approval and service platforms will be promoted to increase efficiency. The zone also plans to establish a product quality tracking mechanism for cross-border e-commerce business, encouraging not only e-commerce companies, but also inspection, insurance, storage and logistics businesses, to take part in the mechanism.

Pingtan is the closest region to Taiwan in East China's Fujian province, and will further take advantage of this geographical position to deepen cross-Straits integration, facilitate the investment from Taiwan-funded enterprises and promote cross-Straits financial cooperation. It will also support industrial associations and social organizations from Taiwan to set up branches there and participate in public activities. Also, several culture and education centers will be built to strengthen communication between the Chinese mainland and Taiwan. To boost trade and economic flow, the program proposed to accelerate the construction of an international tourist island, including the building of high-end medical care and health service clusters, and the cross-Straits film, television and new media cooperation center. Also, cooperation in tourism related to the Belt and Road Initiative will be expanded by exploring and developing more ancient Maritime Silk Road cultural heritage and relics, according to the program.

(China Daily 12/18/2018 page6)