Photo shows the Longjinhu Park in Longyan City, southeast China's Fujian Province.
While ranking high in per capita gross regional product among the 20 key cities in China's old revolutionary base areas, Longyan in Fujian Province is seeking to spur transformative growth to spearhead high-quality development.
For years, the city in western Fujian, southeast China, has not only steered local manufacturing industries toward value chain extension and technology-led growth, but also leveraged intercity partnerships to expand growth space.
In Longyan, urban prosperity has always been built on burgeoning industries. It currently boasts industrial chains for new materials including semiconductor materials and high-performance metallic materials, as well as new energy, non-ferrous metals such as copper and gold, and mechanical equipment.
Photo shows the Shimen Lake of Guanzhai Mountain in Liancheng County, southeast China's Fujian Province.
Last year, manufacturers across local copper and gold industrial chains generated more than 160 billion yuan in output, and industrial clusters for engineering machinery, special-purpose vehicles and environmental protection equipment had taken shape there.
In 2025, 479 new projects broke ground, while major industrial projects involving lithium batteries, smart steel and energy storage battery cells were completed and put into production.
As preferential policies, incentives and subsidies for tech upgrades, R&D and commercial application of new products continued to improve its business environment, innovation became a key growth driver there.
Photo shows the Future City of the Northern New Town of Longyan Central City (Xiamen-Longyan Cooperation Zone) in southeast China's Fujian Province.
Currently, Longyan is home to 27 "little giant" businesses and 257 province-level small- and medium-sized enterprises that are specialized and innovative in niche markets.
Such precise resource leveraging, value chain extension led by chain leaders and an innovation-friendly business environment were Longyan's priorities in fostering high-quality growth over the past years.
Another quintessential example is that some local ore is now sold by the gram rather than by the tonne, as Longyan has managed to transform mineral resource abundance into advantages in new materials to expand local industrial chains.
Unsurprisingly, a local supply of over 75 percent of core materials for lithium batteries enabled Longyan to establish a closed-loop industrial chain spanning lithium resources, battery materials, battery production and recycling.
Moreover, its growing advantages in new materials and its existing industrial base in mechanical equipment helped attract large smart driving and new energy vehicle enterprises to operate there, including EACON Mining, Ecar Tech and Zeron.
By partnering with Guangzhou, Longyan has served as a satellite city, leveraging Guangzhou's corporate headquarters, R&D and market advantages to build an advanced regional manufacturing center. (Edited by Duan Jing with Xinhua Silk Road, duanjing@xinhua.org)
A single purchase
