BEIJING -- The Chinese authorities have fixed 12 open economy new system pilot regions, according to the Ministry of Commerce on May 16.
The 12 regions include cities and zones such as Jinan, Nanchang, Tanshang, Zhangzhou, Dongguan, Fangchenggang, Pudong New District, Liangjiang New District, Xi Xian New Area, Dalian Jinpu New District, Wuhan Metropolitan Area and Suzhou Industrial Park.
Objective of the pilot program is to form a batch of experience and models that can be copied in terms of new mechanism for market resource allocation, new model for economic running management, new landscape for all-round opening-up, and new advantage in the international cooperation and competition, further expand depth and breadth of the country's opening-up to the outside, and lay a solid foundation for the basic formation of the open economy new system and all-round opening-up new landscape during the 13th Five-Year Plan period (2016-2020).
Unlike the domestic free trade zones (FTZ), focus of the pilot program is to form new systems and mechanisms fit for the opening-up, said the MOC spokesperson Shen Danyang.
At present, China set up FTZs in Shanghai, Tianjin, Guangdong and Fujian.
The FTZs and the open economy new system pilot regions are complementary to each other. The FTZ focuses more on the opening-up, while the open economy new system pilot region more highlights the breakthrough in new systems and supporting reform for the opening-up, according to Shen.
The open economy new system pilot regions will not affect roll-out of the third batch of FTZs as they are two separate lines, Shen added.
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