Brief Introduction and Investment Enviroment of Wuhan

Wuhan — The Economic Geographic Center Of China

A Brief Introduction of Wuhan

Being the capital city of Hubei Province , Wuhan is an important central city in China and the political, economic, scientific & technological, cultural and financial center in inland China . The third longest river of the world, the Yangtze River , and its longest branch, the Han River , cross here and divide the city into three parts, Hankou, Hanyang and Wuchang. There are 13 administrative districts in the city. It covers an area of 8,467 square kms and has a population of 8.31 million.

Wuhan has been known as the 'Thoroughfare to Nine Provinces'. Since it is about 1,000 kilometers away from Shanghai in the east, Zhongqing in the west, Guangzhou in the south and Beijing in the north, the megalopolis is definitely aimed to be the center of China 's economic geography.

Since the opening to the outside world, Wuhan has developed very quickly and the economy has kept a continual and steady growth. The scale and comprehensive strength of the economy have largely increased after it was approved to be the opening city along the Yangtze River in 1992. The average economy growth from 1992-1998 reached 16%, which is above the average level of the province and country. For several years, Wuhan has been ranked No.6 in the top 50 cities of China for comprehensive economic strength. The GDP of 2001 reached 134.8 billion RMB, grew by 12% than that of last year. The accomplished fixed asset investment of the society was 50.1 billion RMB, an increase of 10.1%.

As one of the biggest commercial centers in inland China , Wuhan has strong commercial distribution ability. It has a vast potential market. There are about 1 million commercial organizations in the city. 3 commercial groups and 3 department stores were ranged within the top 100 largest commercial groups in the country. Supermarket and chain stores grew fast. There are altogether 800 various kinds of commodity transaction markets.

The financial departments of the city operated smoothly and the capacity of resisting the risk has been enhanced. Banks and securities exchange networks are dotted all over the city. Up to now, there are 2 foreign funded banks opened their branches here, and 7 more have setup the representative offices. The financial radiation and service capacity of the city have been improved.

Being the technology, culture and education center in central China , the comprehensive technology research and education strength of Wuhan is ranked third in the country, just following Beijing and Shanghai . There are 30 universities, 736 scientific research institutes and 10 state level labs. The city has a solid education and technology research basis with completed facilities and strong technology supporting capacity. There are 45 academicians of China Academy of Science and China Academy of Technology in Wuhan together with more than 400 thousand professional technicians. The state level Opt electric Information Industry Base of China is in Wuhan . Wuhan China Optical Valley has become a competent brand in the competence among the large cities in the world. In the new millennium, Wuhan will continually promote the development of industry and city function, to establish a sustainable economic development model. We will concentrate on the development of telecom, IT, biology engineering, new medicine, integration of the optical, machinery and electricity, new material, laser, software, etc. At the same time, we will transform the existed iron and steel, automobile and machinery industry, finally change Wuhan into an important high-tech industry base in the country.

Wuhan takes great advantage of water supply and power supply. Yangtze River , the third largest river of the world and its largest branch, Hanjiang River intersects at Wuhan , where there are 189 lakes located. The average water resource per person of Wuhan stands at the head of the large cities in the world.

Having abundant human cultural and tourist resources, Wuhan is also a famous city in Chinese history and culture as well as a city with beautiful scenes of hills, water and parks. The famous Yellow Crane Tower , The Guiyuan Temple, East Lake Scenic Zone are all located in Wuhan . The famous 1911 revolution also took place in Wuhan . Wuhan is also the transit city to the famous Three Gorges.

The General Introduction of Foreign Investment in Wuhan

Wuhan has been a hot point for foreign investment in central and west China since it was approved to be one of the opening cities along the Yangtze River in 1992. By the end of August 2002, there are 46 different countries and regions invested in Wuhan . We have accumulatively approved 5905 foreign invested items, with a total contracted foreign investment of 13.6 billion USD and actually used 10.8 billion USD. Within these items, we have approved 4018 foreign invested enterprises, with a total of 6 billion USD actually received. Over 40 of the Fortune top 500 transnational companies have invested in Wuhan with a total investment over 2.6 billion USD. These Top 500 enterprises include American GE, AB, Coco-cola, Pepsi, UTA, Corning from USA; NEC, Mitsui, Minolta, Kawasaki from Japan; Siemens, Metro, Thyssen Krupp from Germany; PSA, Total-Fina, Carrefour, Society General Bank from France, Phillips from Holland, BOC from England, etc. There are 110 district-level and area-level headquarter agencies of transnational companies set up in Wuhan . Wuhan also has 11 twin cities in Japan , German, Britain , America , Holland , France and South Korea , through which, the mutual communication in commerce, culture, sports and education in developing quickly.

The Improved Investment Environment

In recent years, Wuhan Municipal Government insist the opening oriented policies and environmental renovation, and the investment environment of the city has been continuously improved. On one hand, the city invested 40 billion RMB annually on fixed assets, to improve the infrastructure facilities and to form the modern system of road, information, ecology, drainage and flooding prevention; a series of important infrastructure projects have been finished, such as Wuhan International Airport, Airport Super Highway, No. 2 Yangtze River Bridge, one million program phone system, water plant, power plant and waste water treatment plant, which have largely improved the city functions; on the other hand, we improved the soft environment by changing the government function and improve the system and legislative standardization of the environment.

We set up the Foreign Investment United Service Center , and established system of regular meeting between mayor and foreign investor representatives, the foreign investors complaint system and the investment environment duty system. Through half year's investigation and evaluation, Shanghai-Hong Kong Yangtze River Development Promotion Association made a conclusion that Wuhan is the city with best environment within 15 large sixed cities along the Yangtze River . After evaluation on Wuhan's investment environment, United Nation Industry Development Organization made a conclusion that Wuhan is the best choice for investment in central and west part of China

The Investment Opportunity of Wuhan

Since China has entered the WTO, as one of the most important city in central China, Wuhan will be constructed to be a modern international city with a sustainable economic, social, and ecology system. Wuhan will attract more and more investors by its improved investment environment.

The general investment cost in Wuhan is only about 1/3 of that in the coastal cities in China . For example, the average wage of a worker in Wuhan is about 1100 USD per year while the wage of common technical and management personnel is about 1900 USD per year. The land price in the state level development zones in Wuhan is only about 27.1 USD/m2. The prices of water, electricity, gas etc. are also much lower than those in coastal cities.

Wuhan Wujiashan Technology Development Zone is the development zone approved by central government for attracting the investment from foreign countries, especially from Taiwan . There are 29 food and beverage companies located in the zone, with a total investment of 215 million USD. Taiwan Presidency Company, France Danone Group, America Pepsi Company made the investment here. There are 14 medicine industries, 16 package industries, 11 building material and other high-tech enterprises in the zone.

In the new century, we see a new China entering WTO, successful biding for 2008 Olympic Games. All theses changes will give Wuhan a closer contact with the world and there will be more and more mutual investment and trade cooperation opportunities.

We sincerely welcome more and more foreign businessmen to come to Wuhan for a visit, inspection and investment.

Please Contact: Wuhan Foreign Investment Office

Tel: 86-27-82783680; 82787095

Fax: 86-27-82813001

Email: whfio@public.wh.hb.cn

　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　[Origin:Wuhan Government Website]