Tianjin Shines in China's North
Mayor's Bank Ties
Help Rust-Belt Port
Gain Foreign Funds
TIANJIN, China -- This northern port city has long been a sleepy neighbor to Beijing. But Tianjin's leaders, led by former central banker Dai Xianglong, have been shaking things up.
Since he took over as mayor in 2003, Mr. Dai has helped attract multinational companies to the city with favorable investment policies. He has tapped his banking connections to bring in hundreds of billions of yuan in loans to rejuvenate Tianjin. Just last month, the central government pledged to make development of the city's Binhai New Area, an investment zone that is already home to foreign companies like Motorola Inc. of the U.S., a priority over the next five years.
Tianjin's rise reflects the emphasis that President Hu Jintao's administration has put on rejuvenating northern China -- known as the country's rust belt for its ailing, huge state-run enterprises -- and narrowing the wealth gap with the prosperous south. Dynamic officials like Mr. Dai have been tapped by top leaders to help bring up those laggard areas.
Central leaders' focus on Binhai "is a historical breakthrough for Tianjin," says Zhang Lichang, the city's Communist Party secretary.
Traditionally seen as the economic center of northern China, Tianjin has long had a well-established industrial base and one of the country's finest ports. In 1984, the central government included the city among 14 coastal open cities enjoying more market-oriented policies. But Tianjin still lagged behind Beijing and other cities to the south, especially as central leaders focused on developing Shenzhen and other special economic zones in southern China in the 1980s, and then Shanghai and its Pudong New Area in the 1990s.
All that is changing. Utilized foreign investment in Tianjin has surged by an annual average of 32% over the past five years, totaling $10.3 billion for the period. Investments in roads, factories and other fixed assets have doubled in the same period over the previous five years, to a total of 534 billion yuan ($66.7 billion). And last year, the economy grew 14.5%, compared with the national average of 9.9%.
Many city residents attribute the turnaround at least in part to Mr. Dai. Having helped secure hundreds of billions of dollars in loans, the 62-year-old former governor of the People's Bank of China has spearheaded a campaign to transform the city. Countless old properties have been pulled down to make way for modern high rises and luxury-housing complexes. The city has widened its roads and is building a subway system. New museums are under construction and parks have opened along the Hai River running through the center of the city.
Mr. Dai also has strived to build up Tianjin as northern China's financial center. He played an active role in the establishment last year of Bohai Bank. The bank, which is 19.99% held by Britain's Standard Chartered Bank, could play a key role in boosting growth in the region, such as by providing loans to the private sector, local economists say.
After aggressive lobbying by Mr. Dai, the state-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission, which oversees China's key state-owned companies, chose Tianjin as one of three sites for setting up an experimental property-rights exchange in March 2004. These exchanges help facilitate the sale of companies owned by the central government, with total deals potentially valued in the trillions of yuan. (Beijing won the right to host one of the other two exchanges, reportedly after lobbying by Mayor Wang Qishan, another former banking official.)
Mr. Dai and other city leaders are also touting the Tianjin Binhai New Area as the "third pole" for China's economic growth, in a role similar to those played by the Shenzhen special-economic zone and Shanghai's Pudong area in revving up development in their respective regions. Situated across the sea from Japan and South Korea, Binhai is already home to investors from more than 100 countries, drawn by its competitive land and labor costs, preferential tax policies and a large talent pool fed by nearly 200 neighboring universities and research institutions.
At Tianjin Samsung Electronic Co. in Tianjin Binhai New Area recently, workers assembled video cameras, video recorders and DVD players. The company is among 11 joint-venture projects Samsung Group has set up with Tianjin Zhonghuan Electronic Information Group Co. with a total value of $1.16 billion.
Jin Shengzhi, Tianjin Samsung Electronic's general manager, says Tianjin is attractive because of its developed components industry and favorable policies. "Local government officials give strong support to our ventures," often asking whether the company is facing any difficulties and offering to help, he says.
Tianjin is also getting a boost from the central government, which pledged in its new five-year economic-development plan to "advance the development and opening up of Tianjin Binhai New Area." As a result, the area is expected to get the go-ahead to build China's largest tax-free port, to experiment with other market overhauls and to offer favorable taxation policies for high-tech ventures.
Some major state investments are already coming to Tianjin. Early this year, Sinopec Tianjin Co. got the nod from Beijing to set up a vast petrochemical complex that will produce more than one million tons of ethylene a year once it is operational in 2008. The project is the city's largest industrial program, with total expected investment of 25 billion yuan, according to a recent report by the official Xinhua News Agency.
China's General Administration of Civil Aviation last October signed an agreement to set up the country's only civil-aviation science and technology industrialization base in the city, to conduct research and manufacture equipment. That could give Tianjin an edge in a continuing, heated race among several cities, including Shanghai, Xian and Zhuhai, to win a bid to set up an assembly line to build A320 airplanes for Airbus.
醒来了，天津
与北京近在咫尺的北方港口城市天津似乎一直都在沉睡之中，但现在，这座城市的领导者们在前央行行长戴相龙的带领下，正在将它从沉睡中唤醒。
自从戴相龙出任天津市市长以来，天津实行的优惠政策吸引著更多跨国公司到这里落户。戴相龙运用其在银行界的关系为天津的振兴引来了数千亿美元资金。就在上个月，中央政府将开发天津滨海工业区列为未来五年优先发展目标。目前该工业区已有包括摩托罗拉(Motorola Inc.)在内的外国企业设立的工厂。
北方由于有大量不景气的国有企业而成为中国的“锈蚀地带”。而天津的日渐崛起反映了胡锦涛领导下的中国政府实施的振兴北方经济、缩小北方与南部发达地区经济差距的战略。为此，中央将戴相龙等一批富有活力的官员派往这些落后地区主管工作。
天津市市委书记张立昌说，中央将滨海工业区纳入重点目标是天津的一个历史性突破。
天津传统上是中国北方的经济中心。它有长期积累下来的良好的工业基础，天津港也是中国最好的港口之一。1984年，天津被列入全国十四个沿海开放城市，得以享受更多的市场化政策。但天津的发展仍落后于北京和南方一些城市。八十年代中央在华南设立了深圳等经济特区，九十年代又将上海浦东新区作为优先发展目标，这些政策使天津的差距越来越大。
但现在这一切正在变化。过去五年来，天津实际利用外资金额在以平均每年32%的速度增长，五年间的外商投资总额达到了103亿美元。同一时期，天津在公路、工厂和其他固定资产上的总投资额达到了人民币5,340亿元(合667亿美元)。去年，天津的经济增长率达到了14.5%。高于9.9%的全国平均水平。
许多天津市人认为，天津之所以能取得这么大的成就，至少在一定程度上要归功于戴市长。帮助天津拿到数千亿美元贷款的戴相龙为改变天津面貌发起了一场“战役”。大量危旧房屋被推倒，建起了现代化高楼和高档住宅区。道路拓宽了、地铁系统在建设中、还有新建的博物馆，流经市中心的海河岸边也被辟成了公园。
戴相龙还在力争将天津建成中国北方的金融中心。他为去年成立的渤海银行(Bohai Bank)立下了汗马功劳。当地经济学家说，该行可通过为民营企业提供贷款等业务为天津的经济发展发挥积极作用。渣打银行(Standard Chartered Bank)持有渤海银行19.9%股份。
在戴相龙的积极争取下，中国国有资产管理委员会(Assets Supervision and Administration Commission) 2004年3月选择天津作为三家试点性质的国有资产产权交易中心之一。交易中心为中央政府出售所拥有资产提供了方便。估计央产转让的交易额有可能达到数万亿元人民币。（据说在市长王歧山的努力下，北京市获得了设立另一家交易中心的许可。王也曾在银行界供职。）
戴相龙和天津市其他领导还大力宣扬滨海新区将成为中国经济增长的“第三极”，就振兴区域经济而言，它将发挥类似深圳特区和上海浦东新区一样的作用。这里与日本和韩国隔海相望。低廉的土地和劳动力成本、优惠的税收政策、接近200所大专院校和研究机构提供的人才储备已让天津吸引了来自100多个国家的投资者。
最近在滨海新区，记者见到在天津三星电子(Tianjin Samsung Electronic Co.)的车间里，工人们正在组装录像机、摄像机和DVD播放机。这家工厂是三星集团(Samsung Group)与天津中环电子信息集团(Tianjin Zhonghuan Electronic Information Group Co.)组建的11个合资项目之一，这些合资项目的总价值达11.6亿美元。
天津三星电子总经理金圣植说，天津吸引他们的是它发达的电子元器件行业和优惠政策。他说，当地政府对他们的企业非常支持，经常问他们有没有遇到什么困难并提供相应的帮助。
天津的发展还得到了中央政府的支持。在前不久制定的“十一五规划”中，中央强调“推进天津滨海新区的发展和开放”。在此背景下，天津有关建设中国最大自由港、推出其他市场化配套改革、向高科技企业提供税收优惠的计划很有希望得到中央的首肯。
一些国有大型企业也已在天津投资大项目。中国石化天津公司(Sinopec Tianjin Co.)在天津建设大型石化厂的计划今年初已获得中央批准。这个计划2008年投产的项目设计年产乙烯100万吨以上。该项目是天津最大的工业项目。据中国官方媒体新华社报导，预计项目投资总额在人民币250亿元以上。
中国国家民航总局(General Administration of Civil Aviation)去年10月签署协议，计划在天津成立中国唯一一家民航科技工业基地，从事科研和设备制造。目前，包括天津、上海、西安和珠海等城市一直在竞争为空中客车(Airbus)组装A320飞机的项目。民航总局的上述计划将为天津平添一大优势。
