Nansha port, located in South China's Guangdong Province, handles hundreds of containers every day. (Photo: Chen Qingqing/GT)
The total number of newly established enterprises in Nansha between January and October was 17,525, representing a year-on-year increase of 51 percent.
As of the end of October, 1,485 foreign companies had set up branches in the area, accounting for 3.1 percent of the total number of companies operating there, the local authority said in a report sent to the Global Times.
But for Nansha, some obstacles exist in administrative management, Li noted. "Although some power has been delegated to lower levels, provincial organs have the final say," he said, adding that Shenzhen, as the special economic zone of the province, is much better at communicating with the central government.
Also, set corporate tax rates at 15 percent in Qianhai and Hengqin have become the exclusive favorable policies in those two areas, Li, the dean, explained.
Different roles
Nansha, however, is not a competitor to other FTZs in the province, as they are all complementary to each other, noted Li Jinghong, the deputy general manager who works at the Nansha port.
"Qianhai focuses on financial services and high-tech, Hengqin targets tourism and cultural exchange with Macao, while Nansha targets logistics and shipping services," he said.
In 2016, the port handled a total of 12.73 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs), according to the local government.
"The number will reach 14 million TEUs by the end of this year," Li noted.
While Nansha has come up with a slew of projects for the next few years, covering various sectors such as advanced manufacturing, high-tech, financial services and so on, the area should look beyond the province, noted Li Shanmin, the dean from Sun Yat-sen University.
"It could become a crucial location connecting the eastern parts of Zhongshan city with Binhai New Area in Dongguan city," he said.
Those two cities of Guangdong are also major manufacturing hubs in the Pearl River Delta area that sell products throughout the world.
Expansion goals
Chinese Vice Premier Wang Yang called for broader global cooperation during the Fortune Global Forum held in Guangzhou from December 6 to 8, telling the audience that China will continue to open its market to the world.
FTZs serve as pilot areas engendering further economic opening-up and reforms related to industrial policies, Pan Yuzhang, director-general of the General Affairs Office of the Nansha FTZ, told the Global Times on Friday.
"Some sectors have not fully opened to foreign capital, such as services and finance, as some policies drafted decades ago do not accord with emerging industries like e-commerce," he said.
Nansha has unveiled a slew of new policies to encourage investors to implement their businesses in the area. For example, local authorities will provide grants worth between 5 million and 10 million yuan to the foreign advanced manufacturers that register with values above $10 million.
"The issue is that there are a lot of buzzwords in investment zones," said David Frey, partner with KPMG, noting that those words are in local authorities' promotional materials.
As a result, it is important to scratch beneath the surface to find out whether those words are really supported by the policy, he told the Global Times on Friday.
Some foreign investors are still lacking access to reliable information, as well as evidence of long-term policy planning and commitment, which have become major challenges, Frey noted.
