A citywide meeting on advancing investment promotion was held on the morning of the 9th to review recent progress and outline key priorities for the next stage. Deputy Chief of the CPC Qingdao Municipal Committee and Mayor of Qingdao Ren Gang attended the meeting and delivered his remarks.

Ren affirmed the belief that attracting investment is a fundamental pathway to accelerating Qingdao’s high-quality development as it is also an objective measure of the municipal administration’s work style and capability and an important reflection of sound performance evaluation. Government departments at all levels have been placing the task in a prominent position since last year to strengthen goal-oriented management, improve investment attraction methods and refine evaluation mechanisms with clear results. He also called for stronger exchanges and benchmarking to encourage competition and progress while promoting a work style by being “practical, innovative, fast and strict”. Efforts should focus on strengthening capabilities in project planning, investment attraction, project implementation and service support to further improve the city’s investment promotion work.

Ren stressed that this year’s investment promotion efforts should focus on securing breakthroughs in a number of landmark, high-quality projects. The city needs to strengthen its investment appeal by leveraging its advantages in the marine economy and the China Health Bay initiative and rely on leading enterprises, coordinate scenario-based resources and expand market opportunities, while, at the same time strengthen factor support and reduce investment and operating costs to continuously stimulate market interest in investing in Qingdao. Support mechanisms must also be strengthened for the city to improve project referral and performance-based incentive mechanisms so that municipal-level guidance funds can boost operational vitality and investment efficiency. This will also actively activate the market and promote mergers-and-acquisitions-based investment attraction. Ren also called for stronger implementation momentum whereby authorities should refine horizontal and vertical evaluation systems for investment promotion outcomes, strengthen incentives and accountability, and enhance routine coordination. Officials should fully present achievements, thoroughly examine problems, clearly summarize experience and formulate practical solutions to ensure effective implementation, improve the results of investment promotion, and provide sustained momentum for the city’s high-quality development.

The meeting was chaired by Vice Mayor of Qingdao Gao Jian, with Deputy Chief of the Qingdao West Coast New Area Working Committee Gao Shanwu in attendance.