Original title: Beijing Writes Colorful Chapters in the Decade of Silk Road - An Overview of Beijing's Efforts to Pilot and Demonstrate High-standard Belt and Road Cooperation
Centuries ago, northwest Beijing was a thriving commercial hub, where foreign merchants traded furs for China's silk. The Grand Canal was a bustling thoroughfare for cargo ships transporting goods from around the globe.
Today, camel caravans and fleets of merchant ships have been replaced by jetliners taking off from the two international airports and China-Europe freight trains with increased shipping capacity. The connectivity in this digital age has further integrated the city into the world.
Over the last decade, Beijing has made significant efforts to pilot and demonstrate high-standard Belt and Road cooperation, as well as contribute to the country's endeavors to establish physical, institutional, and people-to-people connections. Beijing is adding a wonderful chapter to the brand-new Silk Road legend through its smart manufacturing, services, standards and brands.
Infrastructure Connectivity Underpins Prosperity
In early 2023, flight JD455 operated by Capital Airlines arrived in Male, the capital of the Maldives, with almost 200 Chinese passengers from Beijing. The flight was welcomed with a water cannon salute at Velana International Airport, which had undergone reconstruction by a Beijing-based company and had only been open for three months.
"We have created many firsts in the Maldives, which are also the firsts for Chinese construction companies," said the contractor, a team from Beijing Urban Construction Group (BUCG). With its expertise in constructing Beijing Daxing International Airport and utilizing smart construction techniques, it has set a new record for Chinese companies in coral sand reclamation abroad. It has also built the largest modern seaplane terminal and the first Class 4F runway in the region.
Infrastructure connectivity is crucial for promoting cooperation and development, paving the way for shared prosperity. Beijing-based companies have a proven track record in this area, and are well-equipped to contribute to these efforts.
"As major project participants, enterprises in Beijing have accelerated the infrastructure construction in roads, ports, municipal administration, among others, resulting in landmark projects that have brought benefits to the local community," said an official from the Beijing Municipal Commission of Development and Reform and the Office of the Leading Group for Promoting the Belt and Road Initiative of Beijing Municipality.
In 2021, construction workers from Beijing completed the construction of a highway connecting Balikpapan and Samarinda in Indonesia, which marked the end of Kalimantan's history of lacking highways. This nearly 100-kilometer road has also become a crucial link to the country's new capital region.
The recently inaugurated Jakarta-Bandung High-Speed Railway is the first foreign project to fully use the system, factors, and production chain of China's high-speed railways. Oriental Yuhong, a Beijing-based company, has developed a customized, resilient and waterproof coating that is perfectly suited to the hot and humid local climate.
The Changi NEWater Project Phase II, invested and built by Beijing Enterprises Water Group Limited (BEWG) is one of the largest NEWater plants in Singapore. It accounts for more than 30% of the NEWater production, effectively addressing the local water supply shortage.
Open and unimpeded paths lay a solid foundation for a prosperous future.
Since 2013, companies in Beijing have made direct investments of 6.06 billion dollars in Belt and Road countries, launching a number of major projects in infrastructure construction, as well as resource and energy exploration. According to an official, Beijing’s expertise in technology research and development, consultation, design, investment, construction, operation, and management has enabled its participation in key Belt and Road projects in nearly 20 countries. These include the Mombasa-Nairobi Railway in Kenya, the Jakarta-Bandung High-Speed Railway in Indonesia, the reconstruction of Velana International Airport in the Maldives, the New Gwadar International Airport, and the China-Belarus Industrial Park. Beijing is also a supporter of the key node construction of the Belt and Road International Corridor, facilitating the improvement of local infrastructure and industrial development.
Unimpeded Trade Promotes Win-Win Outcomes
In March 2023, the first China-Europe freight train carrying 55 containers departed from Mafang, Pinggu District in Beijing to Moscow. This marks the emergence of a new, fast and efficient international trade channel for highly sought-after goods, such as auto parts, construction materials, and home appliances.
Apart from exporting goods, Beijing also provides international services. The trade in services has contributed over 20 percent to Beijing's annual foreign trade of 1 trillion yuan. The city has established ties with more than 200 countries and regions in trade in services, and more than 1,000 service providers have conducted cross-border operation.
As companies expand their global presence, they need strong service support in financial, legal and other areas. In order to facilitate this, Beijing has established a matchmaking platform that connects the government, financial institutions and enterprises. The platform aims to secure approximately 29 billion yuan of loans from the China Development Bank and the Export-Import Bank of China to assist Beijing’s enterprises to go global. It also encourages companies such as Wumart Group and Zonergy Corporation to engage in overseas merger and acquisition, and channels market-oriented funds to support Belt and Road cooperation. The Everbright “Belt & Road” Green Investment Fund alone reaches the scale of 3.5 billion yuan.
The BRI Legal and Commercial Innovation Services Platform is a prime example of the city's growing impact in the field of international arbitration. With 652 mediators worldwide and a track record of over 20,000 successfully-mediated cases, which accounts for 60 percent of the total, the platform is an epitome of such influence. Nearly half of the newly recruited foreign arbitrators come from countries in the Belt and Road cooperation.
"Innovative Beijing" is gaining widespread recognition. A number of science and technology parks, such as TusPark Cambridge, and international innovation bases have emerged, attracting innovative organizations from various fields, including Industry 4.0 and R&D in life and health. They not only provide services to local innovators to incubate business forms and expand the market, but also facilitate the exchange of international innovation resources.
Thanks to the collaborative network of technology transfer under the Belt and Road initiative, several international innovation cooperation platforms, including the Asia-Europe Wide Bandgap Semiconductor Science and Technology Innovation Cooperation Center, have been established. This has facilitated the matching of over 7,000 cross-border technologies, with a contract value exceeding 100 billion yuan.
At the governmental level, the Belt and Road comprehensive service system continues to improve. According to a government official, in addition to over 80 overseas service centers for enterprises, service bases for private economic growth, and Belt and Road two-way investment service platforms, Beijing has also established friendly agreements with 226 chambers of commerce and associations from over 90 countries and regions across five continents. This allows enterprises to access security services, project information, policy consultation, and legal and commercial services.
With shared aspirations, we can go a long way together.
As a result, Beijing has sustained rapid growth in bilateral trade with Belt and Road partners. In the first half of 2023, imports and exports reached 907.97 billion yuan, accounting for 50.9 percent of the total during the same period, up nearly 15 percentage points from 2015. An official said that "Behind these figures is an ever-improving trade structure, with the export of home-grown brands and enterprises with proprietary intellectual property rights growing by over 10 percent annually."
Hand in Hand for a Bright Future
Seven years ago, BAIC Group formed a partnership with the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) of South Africa to establish an automotive manufacturing plant, where workers from both countries have collaborated and made progress together. Today, South African workers have gradually become skilled in operating a large number of robots in the welding, painting, and general assembly workshops, and some have even been promoted to the position of workshop equipment supervisors.
"As Beijing-based companies expand globally, they also bring tangible benefits to local communities in terms of poverty alleviation, employment, better production and living conditions, and industrial upgrading," an official said. In 2021, for example, these companies contributed a total of 1.88 billion dollars of taxes and created 77,000 jobs in the countries where they operated.
We follow the same path, engage with each other, pool our strengths, and share the same compassion.
The first rebuilt run-down urban area in Ulaanbaatar is referred to as the "Beijing Community". This is due to the fact that it is the first community designed, planned, and built by a Beijing-based developer, which has improved the living conditions for more than 2,000 residents.
Zonergy Corporation has constructed a new energy photovoltaic power plant in Pakistan that has the capacity to provide electricity to 280,000 households. This power plant is the first on-grid power plant and the largest new energy project in the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor.
Co-founded by Beijing Microread Genetics Co., Ltd. and Kazakhstan's Nazarbayev University, the first genetic testing laboratory in Central Asia is enhancing the local R&D capacity in areas such as precision medicine, agricultural breeding, and forensic testing.
In Zhongguancun Belt and Road Industrial Promotion Center, there is a program named "Vine" to support international students in their pursuit of innovation and entrepreneurship in Beijing. More than 1,200 students have received internships through this program. Upon returning to their home countries, they promote China's solutions to the Belt and Road participants, becoming ambassadors to facilitate inter-connectivity and integration among Belt and Road partners.
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Through concerted efforts, we are embarking on a new journey along the ancient path. Over the past decade, Beijing's smart manufacturing, services, and standards have been introduced at a faster pace to Belt and Road participants, thereby enhancing physical, institutional, and people-to-people connectivity. A more promising Beijing story has already begun along the future-oriented and fascinating Silk Road characterized by innovation, digitalization, green, health, and winter sports. (Cao Zheng）
