China's southern gateway region eyes high-quality development, further opening up

An aerial drone photo taken on May 19, 2024 shows a container storage yard at an automated container handling terminal of Qinzhou Port in Qinzhou, south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. (Xinhua/Zhang Ailin)

BEIJING, June 12 (Xinhua) -- Serving as a gateway to ASEAN countries, south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region is exerting efforts to build itself into a "convenient place" for business operation and the dual circulation of domestic and international markets, eyeing for high-quality development in the new era.

Lan Tianli, chairman of the autonomous region, highlighted Guangxi's new trailblazing achievements in promoting high-quality development as a multi-ethnic border region during a press conference held Wednesday by the State Council Information Office in Beijing.

"The building of the 'convenient place' aims to greatly enhance facilitation in investment, trade, consumption, capital flow, exchanges, logistics and transportation," said the official, adding that further improvements will be made in transportation, cross-regional industrial and supply chains, systematic opening up and business environment.

Guangxi is steadily following its commitment to further opening up and swiftly ramping up its engagement with ASEAN across various sectors. For 20 consecutive years, Guangxi has hosted the China-ASEAN Expo and the China-ASEAN Business and Investment Summit, and ASEAN has been Guangxi's largest trading partner for 24 consecutive years.

Adapting to local conditions to develop new quality productive forces, Guangxi cultivated 10 industrial sectors and six specialty agricultural sectors, each with an annual output value of the whole industrial chain exceeding 100 billion yuan (about 14 billion U.S. dollars), including the metallurgical industry, automobiles, sugar and fruit, Lan noted.

"Last year, Guangxi's fruit production reached 33.89 million tonnes, accounting for about one-eighth of the national total. Additionally, more than half of the durians, mangosteens and other fruits from ASEAN countries are imported through Guangxi," said Xu Yongke, vice chairman of the region, adding that the region is accelerating the construction of the China-ASEAN fruit trading center.

Guangxi also aims to develop the city of Guilin, famous for its impressive Karst landscapes, into a world-class tourism city, Lan said.