Home>News Center>China
           
     

    Nation's 11th Five-Year plan group chewed
    By FENG JIE (China Daily)
    Updated: 2006-03-06 06:45

    Each five-year plan formulated during the past 50 years was a landmark in one way or another - but what the State's top planners have in mind now would leave an indelible mark on the landscape of China, both literally and metaphorically.

    The nation's 11th Five-Year Programme (2006-2010), to be discussed at the ongoing plenary session of the National People's Congress, highlights a drive to foster new city clusters as part of endeavours to address imbalances in regional economic development. Should that proceed as intended, analysts say, there will emerge new clusters of cities like the ones that are built around Shanghai and Beijing.

    By optimizing allocation of resources and dismantling cross-region barriers, they will not just literally revise the landscape of China, but greatly enhance the competitiveness of its booming economy.

    "International competition is now increasingly based on cities, in clusters instead of individually," says Cui Gonghao, a professor at Nanjing University.

    "Even Shanghai will not be able to compete internationally without the Yangtze River Delta that is its hinterland," adds Cui, who is also on the expert panel for city and suburban planning under the Ministry of Construction.

    So what is the advantage? The total is greater than the sum of the parts. By leveraging each other's strengths and sharing expensive infrastructure such as airports and harbours, cities in a cluster carry more weight than if they were competing individually.

    Key resources such as land, water and energy can also be allocated more efficiently. For example, the city of Jiangyin in East China's Jiangsu Province is channeling projects to Jingjiang, its neighbour on the other side of the Yangtze River, to reduce pressure on land use.

    Rational planning would also help harness a widespread propensity for repetitive construction driven by city leaders who see big projects as tickets to a better career.

    While density of airports in the region already stands at a high 0.8 per 10,000 square kilometers, as compared to 0.6 in the United States, the number of airports in the 16-city Yangtze River Delta cluster is estimated to reach a staggering 48 by 2020 if there is no further co-ordination among cities.

    While rolling out a vista for the cities, planners are also paying close attention to rural development, stressing the need to build smaller cities rather than trying to drive rural residents into big cities.

    "This will help accelerate the concerted development of cities and rural areas," says Cui, referring to the State's new emphasis on promoting rural development.

    "The focus was on limiting the expansion of big cities in the past, but it is now on both big, medium and small-sized cities," he says.

    "There have been a few watershed events in urbanization in China, and this is one."

    As the Chinese economy grows and residents move more freely across regions, the natural process of clustering cities has been accelerating in recent years. "The concentration of population and industry in the east has reached a considerable magnitude," notes Lu Bin, a professor at College of Environmental Sciences under Peking University.

    The three most developed city clusters in China - the Yangtze River Delta, the Pearl River Delta and the Bohai Bay Area - are all located in the coastal east.

    Co-ordination of Interests

    But making cities work more closely together will require co-ordination that goes beyond breaking long-standing administrative barriers. Breaking free from bureaucratic mindsets, is the biggest challenge facing the process of city clustering, analysts say.

    "Planning is easy, but implementation is difficult, because the interests (of different cities) will have to be co-ordinated," says Cui.

    The cost of administrative barriers will need to be minimized, says Lu, referring to widespread practices such as charging higher expressway tolls on cars from other cities.

    Some measures for cluster building are simply out of the reach of many cities. Among others, a report by Central China's Henan Province on promoting a city cluster that centres around its provincial capital Zhengzhou, which was recently adopted as part of the province's 11th Five-Year Programme, proposes unifying fiscal departments of the 18 cities in the cluster, and takes away economic-planning rights from counties and cities.

    "Further study is needed to see whether such arrangements are practicable," says Li Pumin, deputy director of the Policy Research Office under the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC).



    Top leaders join lawmakers in discussions
    Job fair held for agricultural and forestry graduates
    Government to boost rural sector
      Today's Top News     Top China News
     

    NPC session: China's PM pledges prosperity for all

     

       
     

    Taiwan opposition leader to visit US

     

       
     

    Nation's 11th Five-Year plan group chewed

     

       
     

    Astronauts set for first space walk in 2008

     

       
     

    China confirms another human bird flu death

     

       
     

    Call for bigger middle-income group

     

       
      Taiwan opposition leader to visit US
       
      Nation's 11th Five-Year plan group chewed
       
      Farmers will benefit from higher spending
       
      Deputies developing understanding of role
       
      Japan, China to discuss East China Sea issue
       
      Astronauts set for first space walk in 2008
       
     
      Go to Another Section  
     
     
      Story Tools  
       
      Related Stories  
       
    China seeks further scientific prowess
       
    China's Five-Year Plan targets achieved earlier
       
    CPC sets blueprint for next five years
       
    Proposals for 11th five-year plan approved
    Manufacturers, Exporters, Wholesalers - Global trade starts here.
    Advertisement
             
    亚洲av中文无码乱人伦在线播放 | 色婷婷久久综合中文久久一本 | 国产激情无码一区二区| 日本中文字幕网站| 久久亚洲精品无码观看不卡| 亚洲人成网亚洲欧洲无码久久| 日本免费中文字幕| 天堂无码在线观看| 久久久久亚洲AV片无码下载蜜桃| 免费看成人AA片无码视频羞羞网| 无码不卡亚洲成?人片| 久久青青草原亚洲av无码app | 无码精品尤物一区二区三区| 中文无码制服丝袜人妻av| 国产成人无码av片在线观看不卡| 亚洲AV无码一区二区三区DV| 最近中文字幕大全2019| 久久超乳爆乳中文字幕| 亚洲不卡中文字幕无码| 国产AV巨作情欲放纵无码| 亚洲AV区无码字幕中文色| 中文字幕久久精品无码| A级毛片无码久久精品免费| 中文字幕在线播放| 中文字幕国产第一页首页| 中文字幕在线资源| 最近中文字幕国语免费完整| 日韩中文字幕欧美另类视频| 中文字幕AV中文字无码亚| 超清无码无卡中文字幕| 亚洲中文字幕无码久久2017| 日本妇人成熟免费中文字幕 | 少妇人妻综合久久中文字幕 | √天堂中文www官网在线| 中文字幕二区三区| 亚洲中文无韩国r级电影| 中文字幕精品久久久久人妻| 中文字幕一区二区三区乱码| 韩国19禁无遮挡啪啪无码网站| 国产台湾无码AV片在线观看| 亚洲AV无码一区二区二三区入口|