Authorities in Zhangjiagang City have shut down a chemical park that is within easy reach of the Yangtze River coastline in a bid to protect the environment along the Yangtze River. The chemical park used to produce an annual profit of 258 million yuan, but the governments at all levels have focused on long-term development to ensure that the transformation of the industry will help boost the protection of the environment.
In Zhangjiagang Jiangnan Intelligent Equipment Industrial Park, the assembly base project jointly built by Yonggang Group and Baoye Group has entered the trial production stage. Produced here are the various prefabricated components of prefabricated buildings, which makes building a house as simple as building blocks.
The Baoye project is the first large-scale headquarter project introduced by Jiangnan Intelligent Equipment Industrial Park. Looking at the clean factory buildings and automated production lines, many people will not believe that this was once a factory producing chemical products.
Just two years ago, it was where Dongsha Chemical Park was located. The annual income of the chemical park reached 2.8 billion yuan with tax revenue of 258 million yuan, making an important contribution to the local development of the economy and employment.
However, the chemical industry park is a low-level industry with prominent environmental pollution. Lying no more than 4 kilometers away from the Yangtze River coastline, the chemical park is also prone to serious safety risks. In 2013, Zhangjiagang initiated the closure of the park, but this process was very difficult.
Faced with the pressure, Zhangjiagang adopted different measures for 37 chemical companies in the park such as making face-to-face interpretation of environmental protection policies and requirements, providing free skills training, promoting re-employment of employees, and offering 2 billion yuan for compensation and resettlement so as to strive for cooperation and support.
Through 4 years of efforts, at the end of 2017, 37 chemical companies in the park had been shut down and made proper resettlement to free up nearly 3,000 mu of construction land, divert more than 3,000 employees, and reduce more than 5,300 tons of pollutants every year.
The land vacated by the chemical park has provided space for industrial transformation and upgrading. Zhangjiagang has planned a smart equipment industrial park in the original site, focusing on the development of green energy-saving industries.
In order to build the "most beautiful shoreline" of the Yangtze River, Zhangjiagang has relocated 264 chemical enterprises and shut down more than 6,500 polluting enterprises. It has also given priority to the development of circular economy and green industry to truly embark on a green development path.
