At the 2022 China International Fair for Trade in Services, which is being held in Beijing, districts across the host city are showcasing their technological expertise, rich cultural and tourism resources and friendly business environment.

Among them, Chaoyang district has participated in three thematic exhibitions and launched an online show.

The district has set up a booth at the thematic exhibition of financial services in Shougang Park. It displays its role and progress in international exchange; global financial business gathering and development; two-way opening-up of capital markets; attracting international venture capital firms; and innovating management models of digital renminbi.

By introducing prime international financial resources in the district, such as renowned global financial institutions, overseas bourses and international credit agencies, Chaoyang is attractive as a regional financial hub.

It is home to more than 1,600 financial institutions, including more than 350 foreign-funded ones. The contribution by the financial industry’s added value to the district’s GDP grew from 12.2 percent in 2016 to 18.6 percent in 2021.

At another thematic exhibition in Shougang Park, Chaoyang’s display put an emphasis on two aspects: the integration of culture and technology, and new consumption trends of cultural and tourism products.

Innovative products and services, covering sports and fitness, digital music and online videos, feature a host of leading technologies including 5G, ultra-high definition resolution, digital visualization and intelligent interaction.

At the China National Convention Center, the third thematic exhibition focuses on human resources management. There, Chaoyang is the only Beijing representative. It organized three businesses from the district－Chinese job platforms Boss Zhipin and Zhaopin as well as HR management company Risfond－to attend.

Beijing’s central business district is a crucial engine driving Chaoyang’s growth. Data from the CBD administrative committee show that the core area of the Beijing CBD generated 64 billion yuan ($9.27 billion) in tax revenue in 2021, a year-on-year increase of 8.6 percent, contributing one-third of Chaoyang’s total.

The amount surpassed 33 billion yuan in the first half of this year, accounting for nearly 32 percent of Chaoyang’s total.

The Beijing CBD is exploring an innovative growth path and seeks to break through in key areas. Its friendly business environment has attracted an increasing number of companies to site their regional headquarters or first Beijing stores in Chaoyang.

Despite the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic in the global market, nearly 300 new foreign-invested companies registered in the CBD in 2021, reporting a growth rate of 19.21 percent.

Its administrative committee said it will conduct further research into “replicable” cases and advance reform in key areas, in line with international rules and practices. The aim is to contribute a “Beijing CBD solution” to the country’s opening-up policy.

Tongzhou district, now known as the city’s subcenter, opened a pavilion at the thematic exhibition of culture and tourism services in Shougang Park, featuring immersive digital technologies.

The Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal is one of the exhibitions at the pavilion. Using digital technology, the ancient canal, which is still in use, is represented on a wall. By touching the wall, visitors can learn about the river in different historical periods.

The metaverse is another subject the Tongzhou exhibition pavilion addresses. With a Peking Opera-themed interactive system, visitors can “wear” simulations of facial makeup in this traditional performing art, in tune with their facial expressions. They can also put on a pair of glasses featuring virtual reality technology to enter a virtual world.

A slew of companies and research institutions from the city’s subcenter are flexing their technological muscle and showcasing their brand value in the sectors of 5G, artificial intelligence and intelligent hardware.

Meanwhile, the Beijing Daxing International Airport Economic Zone is presenting its achievements in advancing the development of “two zones”－the Integrated National Demonstration Zone for Opening Up the Service Sector and the China (Beijing) Pilot Free Trade Zone.

The airport economic zone, which is still under construction, traverses Beijing’s Daxing district and neighboring Hebei province. It is the only zone that enjoys both favorable policies of a provincial pilot free trade area and those of a municipal pilot FTA. It had attracted more than 2,960 businesses by the end of July, including 53 that involve foreign capital.

Chaoyang district’s display area at the thematic exhibition of culture and tourism services. ZOU HONG/CHINA DAILY

Wang Shu, the world famous architectural designer, showed up at Hangzhou Branch of the National Archives of Publications and Culture (NAPC Hangzhou Branch) yesterday afternoon to introduce the design and construction of the Song-style architectural complex to the audiences.

The site of the NAPC Hangzhou Branch was originally an ordinary abandoned mine. Centered on the objective of “constructing a building complex for book collection with Song-style garden”, Wang Shu and his team extracted the characteristics of Song-era architectures and the essence of Song-style aesthetics from garden and landscape paintings of the Song Dynasty. They made full use of the rocks and stones of the abandoned mine and integrated them with the architectures of the whole garden through comprehensive restoration to establish the layout featured by pavilions built against hills, corridors encircling around hills, pond chiseled in situ and water diverted from outside into the garden.

With painstaking efforts and thousands of design manuscripts, the team endeavored to interpret and present the concept and elegance of the architecture, garden and landscape paintings of the Song Dynasty with modern language. As Wang said, “modern style Song elegance” was the core of the design. As no garden of the Song Dynasty has survived to date, it was a challenge to convert the images in the paintings into large-scale architectures in real sense. He proposed five principles of the architectural concepts during the creation. For example, the principle of nature-oriented construction can maintain the original natural landform and plantation to the maximum extent and ensure a delightful contrast between the architecture and the landscape.

Section from Wener Road (W) to Zhancheng Street (S) of Yunxi Ground-level Road

Despite the negative impact of COVID-19 pandemic, heavy traffic and intense heat, as well as the requirement of ensuring smooth traffic flow during the construction, the section between Wener Road (W) to Zhancheng Street (S) of the Yunxi Ground-level Road was fully open to traffic yesterday, 8 months ahead of schedule. This effectively relieves traffic jams in rush hours.

In addition, the inauguration of the road section ensures expedient access to Hangzhouxi Railway Station, facilitates fast and convenient transportation from Yuhang District to downtown Hangzhou, and brings along the development of economic industrial chain along the road. Also, it is of great significance to the construction of the new urban center in Hangzhou, improvement of urban road network and linking of urban circles in Hangzhou.

On the afternoon of August 30, Zhejiang Provincial Committee Of the CPC held a provincial digital reform promotion meeting. Yuan Jiajun, secretary of the provincial Party committee, attended and delivered a speech, emphasizing the need to learn and understand the spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping’s important instructions on comprehensively deepening reform, especially digital reform, fully implement the spirit of the provincial congress of the CPC, deepen and improve the concept, orientation, goal, and mechanism of digital reform, improve the quality and expand the scope of reform, and provide a fundamental driving force for promoting common prosperity of socialism and provincial modernization.

Deputy Secretary of the provincial Party committee and Governor Wang Hao presided over the meeting. Huang Jianfa, deputy secretary of the provincial Party committee, and other leaders at or above the vice-provincial level attended. At the meeting, representatives of the Reform Office of the Provincial Party Committee and the leading units of “6 Plus 1 Plus 1” system and platform made a work report. Representatives from the General Office of the Standing Committee of the Provincial People’s Congress, the General Office of the Provincial Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, Zhejiang Provincial Public Complaints and Proposals Administration, the Public Security Department of Zhejiang Province, the People’s Court of Zhejiang Province, the Publicity Department of the Wenzhou Municipal Party Committee, Quzhou City, Taizhou City, Lishui City, and Zhuji City made demonstration reports on typical applications. The meeting clarified the goals and tasks for the next two months and for different fields.

Yuan Jiajun fully approved of the effectiveness of the work in the first two months of the digital reform. The digital reform has entered a new stage of harvesting results and creating a golden business card.

Yuan Jiajun emphasized that it is necessary to deeply understand and grasp the essence, positioning, goals, and mechanisms of digital reform in the new journey, better grasp the original intention of the reform, improve understanding, clarify positioning, deepen the goals and tasks, improve mechanisms, and explore new models and mechanisms targeted at modernization and leading modernization. It is necessary to deeply understand that digital reform and the “Two Pilot Drives” are a logical whole. The essence of digital reform is self-revolution, and it is necessary to turn the blade inward and break the bottleneck restrictions; the “Two Pilot Drives” means to continue to write the glorious history of reform and opening up, and bravely enter the deep waters of reform. It is necessary to deeply realize that digital reform is the core carrier of comprehensively deepening the reform, a big scenario for the innovation of ideas and ideas,  a new logic and method for the reform and reshaping of systems and mechanisms, a large examination room for the leaders to learn and practice, and a new mechanism for the whole society to build and share. It is necessary to continue to deepen the construction of digital Zhejiang, and take the lead in forming production methods, lifestyles and governance methods that are compatible with the era of digital transformation. It is necessary to improve the systems and grasp the overall mechanisms to fully stimulate the enthusiasm, initiative, and creativity of all parties, and make reform more sustainable and better.

Wang Hao emphasized that it is necessary to speed up the construction progress, and efficiently promote the construction of major applications to improve the efficiency of digital reform. It is necessary to rack our brains and take the initiative to tackle difficulties, focus on the needs and expectations of people, enterprises, and the grassroots, and carry out research on supply and demand docking, technical support, and institutional guarantees, so as to better promote governance efficiency and service quality, and ensure the quality of digital reform. It is necessary to systematically promote and comprehensively integrate the integration of application development and reform breakthroughs, improve the integration of the province, cities, and counties, inter-departmental coordination, and the linkage operation mechanism of governments, banks, enterprises, and the society, realize efficient sharing of data, services, governance, and other resources, and maximize the advantages of digital reform.

The meeting was held in the form of a video conference, and each city and county (city, district) set up branch venues. The heads of relevant departments directly under the provincial government participated the meeting at the main venue.

[Photo/Facebook account: Hangzhoufeel]

On Aug 26, Beijing Capital Airlines launched the Hangzhou-Lisbon flight, linking China and Portugal in trade, business, and cultural exchange.

Volunteers from Hangzhou Normal University teach seniors to use smartphones at a community in Yuhang district, Hangzhou, capital of East China’s Zhejiang province. [Photo/Hangzhou Daily]

A group of students from the School of Information Sciences and Technology at Hangzhou Normal University recently held an activity to teach seniors how to use smartphones as part of their summer holiday volunteer program.

Members of the group came up with the idea for the activity after they found that many seniors are unsure how to operate smartphones.

The volunteers then designed a curriculum following a survey of what senior citizens are most likely to use smartphones for – paying for purchases, retrieving health codes, as well as seeking medical advice.

The volunteer program, which lasted for nearly two months, benefited more than 8,000 seniors from 57 neighborhoods.

East China’s Zhejiang province has seen rapid advances and significant transformation in several areas over the last 10 years, according to a top provincial official.

Zhejiang’s gross domestic product reached over 7.35 trillion yuan ($1.06 trillion) in 2021, ranking fourth among provincial-level regions in China. Its per capita GDP topped 113,000 yuan, marking an average annual increase of 7.1 percent in the past decade, Yuan Jiajun, Party secretary of Zhejiang, said on Tuesday at a news conference in Hangzhou, the provincial capital.

The income of Zhejiang’s urban and rural residents more than doubled during the period, Yuan said. Last year, the per capita disposable income of urban residents and rural residents stood at 68,487 yuan and 35,247 yuan, respectively.

Zhejiang’s urbanization rate grew in the past 10 years from 63.2 percent to 72.7 percent, and the income ratio between urban and rural residents decreased from 2.37 to 1.94, he said.

In May last year, Zhejiang became a demonstration zone for common prosperity, characterized by a more equal distribution of wealth among its residents. For several years, the province has been making efforts for balanced development between its more developed coastal areas and poorer mountainous areas.

Currently, 30.6 percent of households in Zhejiang have an annual disposable income of 200,000 to 600,000 yuan, a common indicator of middle-income families. The figure is expected to increase to 45 percent by 2025.

Zhejiang’s robust and high-quality development has been driven by strong growth in its digital economy, particularly in the past five years, Yuan said. The province’s digital economy accounted for 48.6 percent of its total GDP last year.

“Reform is always the key,” Yuan said at the news conference. A series of measures to streamline the administrative processes, dubbed the “At Most, One Visit” campaign, has further improved Zhejiang’s governance and business environment, and the ongoing digital reform will inject more vitality into its overall development.

The total number of market entities in Zhejiang currently stands at 9.06 million, up 7.3 percent year-on-year, according to provincial statistics published on Monday. This means one in every seven Zhejiang residents is now a business owner.

The province’s natural environment has also seen steady progress, and public satisfaction with the environment has risen for 10 consecutive years.

People in Zhejiang now have easier access to medical care and public education, Yuan said. “After 10 years of improvement and progress, the people of Zhejiang are now living a more prosperous, happy and meaningful life.”