2024-08-19
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“Putting scientific and technological innovation at the core of the overall development”
Major industrial cities are experiencing a strong comeback.
From a national perspective, the industrial economy recovered strongly in the first half of the year, with the added value of the secondary industry and the added value of industrial enterprises above the designated size increasing by 5.8% and 6.0% respectively, higher than the economic growth rate of 5.0%, which has effectively driven economic growth.
The urban structure was also affected by this. In the first half of the year, the economic growth rates of Suzhou, Chongqing and Quanzhou all reached more than 6%. As a major industrial city in the north, Qingdao also achieved an economic growth rate of 5.8%, of which the growth rate of industrial enterprises above designated size reached 9.8%, ranking first in the province.
Qingdao is now at a critical moment. After experiencing the low point last year, Qingdao's economy has caught up with Shandong's growth rate (5.8%) in the first half of this year, showing a clear upward trend. Its growth rate has surpassed the "models" Ningbo and Tianjin.GDPThe gap has narrowed to 21.2 billion.
As one of the earliest cities in China to start the industrialization process, experts believe that Qingdao's industry "has a good foundation and great potential, but its innovative support for emerging industries is still insufficient."
"In the face of increasingly fierce regional development competition and the urgent need to accelerate the transformation of urban development methods, we must always place scientific and technological innovation at the core of the overall development." On August 16, Qingdao held a city-wide science and technology innovation conference, and the municipal party committee secretary Zeng Zanrong emphasized this.
During this period, Qingdao has successively issued the "Action Plan for Qingdao to Deepen Technological Innovation and Accelerate the Construction of a Science and Technology Power City (2024-2028)" and the "Action Plan for Qingdao to Deepen the Implementation of the "Haichuang Plan" and Accelerate the Construction of an International Marine Science and Technology Innovation Center (2024-2026)"...
It is proposed that by 2028, Qingdao will move up in the rankings of the World Intellectual Property Organization's Top 100 Global Technology Clusters and the Ministry of Science and Technology's National Innovation Cities. As we know, Qingdao is ahead of not only Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen, but also other strong cities of science and innovation such as Suzhou, Nanjing, Hangzhou and Wuhan on these two lists, so it is not easy to move up in the rankings.
Can the frequent introduction of important policies help fill the gaps in industry and become a booster for Qingdao's advancement?
As a major industrial city in the north, Qingdao was once overtaken in recent years due to its weak industrial development.
In 2016, Qingdao's GDP exceeded one trillion yuan, two years earlier than Ningbo. In 2019, Ningbo officially surpassed Qingdao thanks to its outstanding industrial performance - the growth rate of industrial added value above designated size alone was 5.8 percentage points higher than Qingdao. From then on, Ningbo's industrial growth rate will always be higher than Qingdao's from 2020 to 2023.
According to local media analysis, Qingdao's problem lies in "aging industrial structure", "traditional industries account for too large a proportion, leading innovative industries are too few, and the number of employees is limited."
For example, Qingdao, where giants such as Haier and Hisense were born, is the most representative city in China's home appliance manufacturing sector. However, after many years, Qingdao is still well-known for these companies, while other companies have not yet formed a large enough scale.
It is not difficult to see that if Qingdao wants to advance, it must expand and strengthen its industry. From the perspective of practice, in February this year, Qingdao held a city-wide new industrialization promotion conference to conduct special dispatches. The top leaders of the four major teams and the city leaders served as the "chain leaders" of key industrial chains, becoming a powerful engine for industrial development.
According to a relevant person in charge from the Qingdao Municipal Bureau of Industry and Information Technology, Qingdao has issued 50 policy measures for advanced manufacturing, plus 180 district and city characteristic industry policies and 17 fiscal, taxation and financial policies, totaling 247.
Technological transformation has always been an important way to promote the transformation and upgrading of the manufacturing industry. From January to May this year, the growth rate of industrial technological transformation investment in Qingdao (12.4%) was 3.4 percentage points higher than that of the whole province. In the long run, Qingdao has allocated a total of 2.77 billion yuan for investment in technological transformation equipment for inclusive enterprises since 2020.
It is worth mentioning that not long ago, Qingdao was officially selected as one of the first batch of national pilot cities for new manufacturing technology transformation. The next step will be to carry out pilot projects around advantageous leading industries such as smart home appliances, rail transit equipment, and high-end chemicals.
At the same time, emerging industries are beginning to gather momentum. Since 2024, Qingdao has undertaken shipbuilding orders from shipowners in Japan, Singapore and Belgium, with production scheduled until 2028. This also shows that Qingdao has the ability to compete in high-end industrial fields such as container ships and green ships.
The effectiveness of Qingdao's efforts is reflected in economic data. In the first half of this year, the added value of Qingdao's secondary industry was 263.341 billion yuan, an increase of 8.6% year-on-year. This is the first time in three years that the growth rate of Qingdao's secondary industry has outperformed the city's overall market.
Compared with Ningbo and Tianjin, cities in the same echelon, Qingdao also rarely leads in the growth rate of secondary industry added value, the growth rate of industrial added value above designated size, and the growth rate of fixed investment. In particular, in terms of the growth rate of industrial added value above designated size, Qingdao (9.8%) is 4.4 and 1.8 percentage points higher than Ningbo and Tianjin respectively.
"Qingdao's reversal in the first half of the year is closely related to the emphasis on the real economy and the vigorous development of advanced manufacturing in recent years." Zeng Gang, dean of the Institute of Urban Development at East China Normal University, said that the fundamental driving force of industrial innovation lies in scientific and technological innovation. At present, Qingdao's industrial development has a good foundation and great potential, but its innovation support for emerging industries is still insufficient.
In the context of cities across the country, Qingdao has more than 9,300 technology-based small and medium-sized enterprises and nearly 8,000 high-tech enterprises in 2023, which is still a significant gap compared with sub-provincial capitals such as Shenzhen, Hangzhou, Wuhan, and Chengdu. In addition, Qingdao is also on the way to catching up with the above-mentioned cities in terms of data on technology transformation and investment in technology research and development.
Facing the gap, Qingdao is determined to make up for the shortcomings in science and technology innovation. In February this year, Qingdao held a city-wide science and technology work conference and clearly proposedCreate InternationalThe goal is to create a new situation for the development of a digital and innovative city, and to promote the number of high-tech enterprises to exceed 9,000 and the number of small and medium-sized scientific and technological enterprises to exceed 10,000.
On August 1, the Shandong Science and Technology Conference was held, proposing that Party committees and governments at all levels should regard scientific and technological innovation as a major task, and the "top leaders" should personally take charge of it. Not long after, Qingdao issued a heavyweight document, the "Science and Technology Strengthening City Action Plan". The opening statement clearly puts "accelerating the leading of industrial innovation and cultivating new quality productivity and new momentum" in the first place, and "categorizing" to find breakthroughs for different industries.
In terms of specific measures, it is clear that real money will be invested in laboratory construction and transformation of scientific and technological achievements. For example, the leading unit of the newly approved construction (reorganization) of the National Key Laboratory will be given a reward of up to 10 million yuan; support universities, research institutes, and enterprises to provide pilot services, and those who meet the conditions will be given a maximum of 20 million yuan in support. The intensity of reward and subsidy support is not small.
In terms of building a regional innovation highland, the action plan also proposes to build a "Qingdao Science and Technology Innovation Corridor" based on the advantageous areas of science and technology innovation resources such as the Laoshan District to Qingdao Blue Valley. In this regard, Zeng Gang reminded that in the process of promoting the implementation of the science and technology innovation plan, whether it is the introduction of resources or the construction of the science and technology innovation corridor, we must be vigilant against excessive government intervention and focus on giving play to the leading role of the market.
Zeng Gang believes that private enterprises are the main players in scientific and technological innovation, and the private economy is precisely Qingdao's shortcoming. To promote scientific and technological innovation, Qingdao should further strengthen the dominant position of private enterprises in technological innovation, achievement transformation, industrial incubation, etc., and promote the construction of a cooperative mechanism for various ownership economies.
Zeng Gang further stated that Qingdao should learn from cities with outstanding scientific and technological innovation achievements such as Shenzhen and Hefei, and adopt more methods such as "posting a list and appointing a leader" to make the main body's innovation process more autonomous and flexible.
If the "Action Plan for Strengthening the City through Science and Technology" lays out the roadmap for Qingdao's future technological innovation and development from the top level, then the "Ocean Innovation Plan" makes it clear that Qingdao will focus on the ocean, the "blue trump card" of technological innovation.
In fact, the advantage of marine scientific research has always been one of the biggest highlights of Qingdao's scientific and technological innovation. As proposed in the "Haichuang Plan", Qingdao's positioning in the field of marine scientific and technological innovation is "international level":
Qingdao should not only become the vanguard of national high-level marine scientific and technological self-reliance, but also strive to become a source of original innovation in global marine science and technology, and initially build an international marine science and technology innovation center with significant influence.
In fact, since 2021, the "Haichuang Plan" has been shaping Qingdao Ocean by strengthening and supplementing the supply chain.Strategic emerging industriesDevelop new momentum. The newly released action plan can be regarded as the 2.0 version of Haichuang.
From a national perspective, in 2023, Qingdao will achieve a total marine output value of 518.13 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 6.5%, accounting for 5.2% and 30.5% of the national and provincial marine output respectively, ranking third in the country. However, with Shanghai (990.16 billion yuan) and Tianjin (555.05 billion yuan) ahead, Qingdao still needs to promote the upgrading of the industry level in order to improve the visibility of the marine science and technology industry.
In order to strengthen its strengths, the "Haichuang Plan" mentions that it is necessary to strengthen the ability to initiate marine innovation and accelerate the construction of high-level innovation platforms; focus on key areas such as high-end ships and marine engineering equipment, marine Internet of Things, and deploy key technology research projects; gather a group of top talents, high-end industry talents and young talents in the marine field, and strive to attract more than 200 high-end marine talents by 2026.
It is worth noting that the Laoshan District and Qingdao Blue Valley specifically mentioned in the "Qingdao Science and Technology Innovation Corridor" were not "accidental".
Zeng Zanrong, secretary of the Qingdao Municipal Party Committee, has visited Laoshan District and Qingdao Blue Valley for many times this year, most of which are closely related to scientific and technological innovation. During the investigation, Zeng Zanrong stressed the need to accelerate the creation of marine advantage industry clusters.
This undoubtedly points out a major industrial direction of the Science and Technology Innovation Corridor in the future - marine economy. In Zeng Gang's view, if the "Qingdao Science and Technology Innovation Corridor" is implemented, it will add more chips for Qingdao to participate in the competition of marine science and technology innovation.
Zeng Gang said that Qingdao has obvious advantages in developing the marine equipment industry based on its traditional manufacturing industry. However, compared with Shanghai and Shenzhen, the first batch of global marine center cities in my country, Qingdao's local marine research institutions have not yet established a deep connection with corporate needs, resulting in the inability to fully display market orders.
In this regard, Zeng Gang suggested that Qingdao could create conditions to introduce leading private enterprises to give full play to their leading and key organizational role in the construction of industrial clusters and the integration of industrial chain manufacturing capabilities.
In the new round of scientific and technological innovation competition, paying more attention and investing more has become a common choice for cities. In the rapids, not moving forward or moving forward slowly is both a step backward. In order to move forward quickly, in addition to leveraging their core advantages, local governments must also face up to their shortcomings and find ways to make up for them.
Text | Liu Xuqiang