Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong on Friday respectively sent congratulatory letters to the China-Singapore Suzhou Industrial Park on its 25th anniversary. Singapore’s Deputy Prime Minister Teo Chee Hean, Jiangsu Provincial Party Secretary Lou Qinjian, Governor Wu Zhenglong, and Vice Minister of Commerce Qian Keming attended the celebration ceremony and participated in a series of activities.
The Suzhou Industrial Park or SIP for short has introduced and absorbed international advanced technology and management experiences, implemented innovation-driven strategy and achieved a leap forward in development. It has played an important role in promoting mutually beneficial cooperation between China and Singapore, Li said in the letter.
The park should further optimize its business environment, do a greater job in advancing international economic and technical cooperation, continuously enhance its scientific and technological innovation capability to build a first class high-tech industrial park, Li said.
Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said in the letter that the successful development of the Suzhou Industrial Park reflected close cooperation between China and Singapore at all levels, and he hoped the park would continue to play a pioneering role in promoting bilateral cooperation.
Teo Chee Hean spoke highly of the achievements made by the China-Singapore Suzhou Industrial Park over the 25 years. He said that Suzhou Industrial Park has become China's most competitive industrial park with its development model replicated elsewhere. He hoped that the Suzhou Industrial Park will continue to be a pathfinder for China's development, play a demonstration role in expanding cooperation between the two countries, and play an important platform role in strengthening the friendly exchanges between the two peoples.
In his speech, Lou Qinjian said that 25 years ago the Suzhou Industrial Park came into being following the tide of reform and opening up, which is a forward-looking and distinctive initiative in that it created a new model of cooperation between China and Singapore and also witnessed the process of reform in China.
The glorious course of opening up is a vivid example of the great practice of socialism with Chinese characteristics and a vivid epitome of the great achievements of China's reform and opening up, he said.
The success of the construction of Suzhou Industrial Park fully proves that only openness, tolerance and cooperation can achieve mutual benefit and win-win results, said the CPC Provincial chief.
Lou Qinjian pointed out that President Xi Jinping repeatedly mentioned the Suzhou Industrial Park during his state visit to Singapore and hoped that "the Sino-Singapore friendship, like the rain trees planted in Singapore, will be as vibrant and flourishing."
The growth of Suzhou Industrial Park carries the ardent expectations of President Xi Jinping and shoulders a new era mission, Lou said, adding that it is the hope of the party and the government that Suzhou Industrial Park will further emancipate the mind, dock the Shanghai Free Trade Zone, deepen the reform of transforming government functions, boost the comprehensive experiment of opening and innovation, build a world-class high-tech industrial park with high quality and act as an open banner on the new journey of China's modernization drive.
We are willing to further strengthen ties with Singapore, share development opportunities under the framework of the Belt and Road, expand cooperation areas, and innovate cooperation models, he said.
We firmly believe that under the direct concern of the leaders of the two countries, the development of Suzhou Industrial Park will surely achieve new achievements, Lou said, adding that with the joint efforts of both sides, the cooperation between Jiangsu and Singapore will surely achieve more high-quality results and the friendship between the people of Jiangsu and Singapore will continue to be enhanced and passed down from generation to generation.
Wu Zhenglong and Indranee Rajah, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office of Singapore, read the congratulatory letters from Li Keqiang and Lee Hsien Loong. Qian Keming delivered a speech on behalf of the Ministry of Commerce. Zhou Naixiang, member of the Standing Committee of the Provincial Party Committee and Secretary of the Suzhou Municipal Committee, delivered a welcome speech.
A total of 150 new projects signed up or broke ground on Friday to mark the 25th anniversary of the China-Singapore Suzhou Industrial Park, showing the aim of the governmental cooperation project for a higher level of industrial upgrading and further optimization.
Of the newly signed projects, 35 are research and development centers or regional headquarters. The total investment comes to about 50 billion yuan or $7.4 billion, with estimated annual sales exceeding 100 billion yuan once put into operation.
Most of the new projects specialize in biochemical, artificial intelligence, nanometer technology and high-end equipment manufacturing. French biopharmaceutical giant Sanofi announced it is setting up its first Asian research institute, while Johnson & Johnson plans to set up an Asia Pacific open innovation center.
Started in 1994, SIP in Jiangsu province is the country's largest project jointly developed by China and a foreign country, covering 278 square kilometers. In his visit to Singapore in November 2015, President Xi Jinping stressed that continued efforts should be made to develop the SIP, which is one of the major cooperation projects between the two countries.
In his letter celebrating the 25th anniversary of the SIP, Premier Li Keqiang said the park has played a crucial role in mutually beneficial cooperation between China and Singapore, and should strive to become a first-rate high-tech industrial park to facilitate China's high-quality economic development.
Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong also wrote in a congratulatory letter that "the SIP's success reflects Singapore's close working relationship with China at every level".
In 2018, the SIP's economic output of 257 billion yuan represented a 7.1 percent increase year-on-year, which was 227 times the number registered 25 years ago. The cumulative actual utilization of foreign capital totaled $31.3 billion in the park over the past 25 years.
The park, once farmland, has attracted over 4,400 overseas projects from more than 70 countries and regions. Fortune 500 companies such as Siemens, Philips, Emerson and Samsung have launched 156 projects in the park. More than 500 companies, including Apple, Microsoft and Roche have set up research and development centers in the SIP.
Up to 350 Singapore companies have set up offices and branches there. DBS was the first Singaporean bank to locate in the SIP in 2007. Xu Jiayong, head of the DBS Suzhou branch, said that while foreign-owned enterprises made up the majority of clients in the early days, State-owned enterprises, privately owned domestic enterprises and foreign companies now each account for a third of its clientele.
