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Our City Continues to Deepen Innovation in the Pilot Free Trade Zone, Yielding 36 Institutional Innovation Achievements Last Year

From: Lianyungang Daily Updated: 2025-01-18 02:56

Throughout the year, 36 specialized and differentiated institutional innovation achievements were made, with 12 of them being replicated and promoted at the provincial level or above... This is the report card for 2024 from the Lianyungang Area of the Pilot Free Trade Zone. To date, the Lianyungang Area of the Pilot Free Trade Zone has accumulated 206 institutional innovation achievements, including 52 that are national firsts and 105 that are provincial firsts.

Innovation achievements continue to emerge. Recently, the Bank of China Jiangsu Branch (hereinafter referred to as "Jiangsu BOC") successfully launched an innovative international trade financing business centered around the monetization of railway transport documents for China-Europe Railway Express trains for small and medium-sized foreign trade enterprise customers in the Lianyungang Area of the Pilot Free Trade Zone, marking the global premiere of a financial service solution under the pilot project of the United Nations Convention on the Negotiable Instruments Relating to the Carriage of Goods by Sea. Focusing on China-Europe Railway Express trains, Jiangsu BOC introduced the "China-Europe Railway Express Cross-border Financial Express" innovative financial service solution, providing comprehensive financial support for the development of small and micro logistics and foreign trade enterprises involved in the trains. In 2024, specialized and differentiated institutional innovation achievements continued to emerge in the Lianyungang Area of the Pilot Free Trade Zone. In addition, several national firsts were achieved, including the new mode of "five fixed elements" for convenient flag ships to operate without pilotage, "source supervision and direct delivery in one container" for dangerous goods carried by ships, "one document for multiple uses" for international inbound and outbound ship business declaration information, and the new mode of "pre-loading" for specialized grain cars. A series of provincial firsts were also created, such as the efficient regulation model of "comprehensive inspection in one go" and the new mode of "observation period" for law enforcement in the field of market supervision. The "new mode of ‘smart safety supervision’ and quarantine regulation for imported soybeans" was approved and filed by the General Administration of Customs, the case of "leading green and low-carbon port construction through 'electrification'" was selected as one of the third batch of institutional innovation cases in the Yangtze River Delta Pilot Free Trade Zone, and the "'road-rail-sea-river' multimodal transport brand" was selected as an excellent observation case of institutional innovation in the Pilot Free Trade Zones along the Yangtze Economic Belt. Additionally, five cases were included in the provincial innovation practice cases.

The development of leading industrial clusters was promoted. "China Pharma Port" has undertaken over 100 national "major new drug innovation" special projects, with 24 Category 1 innovative drugs approved for marketing, ranking first among all municipalities in China. Advanced manufacturing projects such as the production of LNG tank containers by COSCO Shipping, the demonstration base for electric tugboats by the port group, and the high-end equipment production line by Vanguard have been put into operation, with their product technologies ranking among the top tier in China. Over 600 bulk trade enterprises were newly added, achieving a bulk commodity trade volume of nearly RMB 150 billion, placing it among the forefront nationwide. The new trade format of cross-border e-commerce was accelerated, with the development zone block achieving a cross-border e-commerce import and export volume of RMB 1.22 billion in 2024, a 24-fold year-on-year increase.

The hub's capacity was comprehensively upgraded. Port infrastructure expansion and renovation projects such as the 400,000-ton ore terminal and the 150,000-ton container berth have been put into use. Both near and long-distance ocean routes have been further densified, and cooperation between Shanghai and Lianyungang ports has deepened. Efforts were made to enhance the capacity of logistics support points such as the "Belt and Road" supply chain base, the SCO International Logistics Park, and the Sino-Kazakhstan (Lianyungang) Logistics Cooperation Base, deeply participating in the construction of the Trans-Caspian International Transport Corridor, accelerating the Aktau Port container hub project, and establishing four overseas warehouses in Almaty and Bishkek. Currently, a multimodal transport network with 98 container routes, 24 sea-rail intermodal transport corridors, and 6 international train routes has been formed. In 2024, the port handled 346 million tons of cargo and 6.6907 million TEUs of containers, representing year-on-year increases of 7.65% and 9.03% respectively. Foreign trade throughput reached 159 million tons, a year-on-year increase of 10.52%. A total of 911 China-Europe (China-Central Asia) trains were operated from Lianyungang, a year-on-year increase of 13%.