The “Beautiful Xiamen” initiative started last September is designed to create an even more appealing environment for travelers, investors and local residents.

 

Authorities in Xiamen, Fujian province are advocating a sustainable development model to guarantee a better quality of life for residents by transforming the local economy, improving management systems and adopting environmentally friendly policies.

Known as “Beautiful Xiamen”, the strategic plan was proposed last September and has already shown its appeal to foreign capital.

The city’s contractual foreign investment in the first five months totaled $1.76 billion yuan, nearly 88 percent of the goal set for the year.

?A number of key projects are still under negotiation, 45 of them foreign-funded with a total potential investment value of $5.4 billion, according to the government’s website.

Officials said the improved business environment makes it easier to pass administrative procedures, aided by the Xiamen administrative service center that became operational in late 2012.

?Housing more than 1,100 clerks from 96 government departments, the center examines applications in terms of economic value, construction and social impacts as well as demands on public resources.

?It has 600 items on the service list, more than 94 percent of the city’s total public and administrative services. It handled 1.6 million applications in 2013 and received more than 10,000 people on the busiest day.

One senior official called the center’s efficiency as one of the “biggest highlights” of the city government’s work in the past two years.

?The government is also making Xiamen a “smart city” after integrating high-tech systems and encouraging the use of information.

?Among the many initiatives is the city’s WeChat social networking account used to provide residents with timely information from various departments.

?Its first administrative WeChat account — called the Xiamen Smart Traffic Control Center - began operation in January 2013.

?The first and the largest of its kind in China, it now has more than 252,000 followers. Xiamen is also one of the first cities to build a 4G Wi-Fi network in China.

?Some 95 percent of local residents are expected to have access to the wireless network by 2015 whether they are at home, in an office or aboard public transport vehicles.

“Use of information relies on investment and marketing. But the content we provide is most important,” said Liang Feng, an official from Xiamen municipal government.

“We will provide our residents with complete information experience centers and let them decide what they actually need. And an after-sale service system will also be established.”

?About 1 billion yuan ($164.2 million) was invested in the city’s information infrastructure in 2013, an upgrade that could triple revenues, according to Xiamen municipal government.

The software and information service sectors alone could offer jobs to 43,000 specialists.

In 2015, total spending on information services in Xiamen might surpass 500 billion yuan, said industry observers.

?City officials said Xiamen will develop more advanced one-stop public service systems and give impetus to the creative industry in the coming years.

?As the city makes rapid economic progress, the city’s environment and heritage are under protection.

?“Our ancestors have left us many precious buildings that constitute an important part of the childhood memories of people born in the city and we are working out plans to preserve them,” said Ren Guoyan, chief planner of the Xiamen Municipal Bureau of Planning.

In Licang district alone, more than 200 volunteer teams with more than 30,000 participants are helping protect the environment since the Beautiful Xiamen plan was proposed.

?Despite the achievement, Xiamen officials say it is not the time to rest. Instead, they will further strengthen their efforts to realize long-term plans.

?One goal is to make the city “an example of beautiful China by the end of 2021”, the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Chinese Communist Party.

The plan calls for the average annual disposable income of urban residents to reach 65,000 yuan ($10,712), that for rural resident to hit 25,000 yuan and the per capital GDP will rise to $25,000, double the 2012 level. The average life expectancy will increase to 81.

?From that baseline, local authorities will move on to establish the city “as an example of the Chinese Dream in 2049”, the 100th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China.

?By then the city aims to be at the same level with its peers in developed countries in terms of GDP, living standards and other indicators.

?Other goals in the plan include making Xiamen an internationally well-known garden city, the center of southern Fujian province, the gateway to cross-Straits communication and “an open city filled with happiness”.

Contact the writers at humeidong@ chinadaily.com.cn and lifusheng@ chinadaily.com.cn