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zaozhuang, a coal-producing city in the north, has set its sights on the "eating chicken" business.

recently, zhang hongwei, secretary of the zaozhuang municipal party committee of shandong province, investigated the development of the city's spicy chicken industry. he proposed to study and formulate industry standards for "spicy chicken" as soon as possible, actively develop vacuum instant food on the basis of vigorously promoting dine-in stir-frying, and use internet thinking to expand sales channels, so that the fresh and fragrant "spicy chicken" can truly go out of zaozhuang and go to the whole country.

zhang hongwei mentioned that it is necessary to persist in exerting efforts in the entire chain of breeding, processing and sales, actively strive to create the regional public brand of "zaozhuang spicy chicken", accelerate the creation of landmark food ip with local characteristics, further polish the city's business card of "china's spicy chicken hometown", and promote high-quality economic and social development.

as a classic dish, spicy chicken is available in many places across the country. for example, in sichuan, chongqing, guizhou, yunnan and other places, many restaurants have set "spicy chicken" as their signature dish. why did zaozhuang, a coal city in the north of shandong, focus on the "spicy chicken" business?

it is understood that in 2016, the china cuisine association recognized zaozhuang as the "hometown of spicy chicken in china". in order to promote the zaozhuang spicy chicken brand, the local government has spared no effort, not only holding spicy chicken cultural festivals for many times, but also applying for the geographical indication trademark and intangible cultural heritage project of "zaozhuang spicy chicken", and issuing a spicy chicken industry development plan and establishing the zaozhuang spicy chicken industry association to promote industrial development.

aerial photography of zaozhuang city scenery. photo/visual china

as the city with the smallest economic volume in shandong, zaozhuang's gdp in 2023 was 215.674 billion yuan, ranking last among the 16 cities in shandong. this former coal energy base has faced problems such as resource depletion and a single industrial structure in recent years, and its economic structure urgently needs transformation and upgrading.

at the same time, in recent years, many places have become popular with their food ips, such as liuzhou snail rice noodle, zibo barbecue, tianshui spicy hot pot, etc. analysts believe that zaozhuang is eyeing the "eating chicken" business because it wants to "go viral" with its local signature food, spicy chicken, and thus drive the transformation and development of the local economy.

zeng gang, dean of the institute of urban development at east china normal university, told china news weekly that spicy chicken is a popular delicacy in zaozhuang, and creating the "zaozhuang spicy chicken" ip can increase the city's exposure and popularity, attracting tourists to travel and consume. at the same time, it can also accumulate popularity, boost confidence in economic development, and create a positive development atmosphere.

the idea has been around for a long time

"a serving of spicy chicken costs 100 yuan, which can drive the linkage of the tertiary industry and generate an industrial value of 500 yuan. there are 34,594 small and medium-sized restaurants and 1,078 large-scale hotels in the city. if each restaurant sells a chicken for lunch and dinner every day, assuming 360 days a year, it can generate economic benefits of 12.8 billion yuan." wang xinquan, secretary-general of the zaozhuang cooking and catering industry association and inheritor of the shandong province's intangible cultural heritage of spicy chicken cooking skills, did some calculations.

wang xinquan has been thinking about how to promote the development of zaozhuang's spicy chicken industry for many years, and has participated in the application process for the title of "hometown of spicy chicken in china". he told china news weekly that at present, zaozhuang's spicy chicken "can be made by every family, is available in every store, and is loved by everyone". in his view, when a chicken moves, all industries will flourish. the spicy chicken industry is the project in zaozhuang that is most likely to become a tens of billions or even hundreds of billions industry.

according to him, the main ingredients of traditional zaozhuang spicy chicken are all sourced locally. the representative ingredient, sunzhi chicken, is a local poultry breed unique to zaozhuang and has been included in the national list of livestock and poultry genetic resources. other ingredients and condiments, such as chili peppers and soy sauce, are also local specialty varieties and products.

zaozhuang spicy chicken. photo/visual china

according to local media reports in shandong, zaozhuang consumes nearly 100 million chickens every year, and there is a saying among locals: "if a chef doesn't make spicy chicken, don't open a restaurant in zaozhuang." now, zaozhuang spicy chicken, which has always been popular in the local area, also wants to "fly further."

in recent years, many places have been creating special food brands, hoping to drive industrial development and promote the city's "out-of-the-box". for example, liuzhou, zibo, and tianshui have successfully "out-of-the-box" with their local specialties, snail noodles, barbecue, and spicy hot pot. recently, lanzhou has specially issued the "three-year action plan for the high-quality development of lanzhou beef noodles industry (2024-2026)"; shijiazhuang announced that it will promote the use of the "shijiazhuang beef noodles" brand.

against this backdrop, it is not difficult to understand zaozhuang’s intention to accelerate the creation of local landmark food ip and polish its city’s business card as “china’s hometown of spicy chicken”.

zeng gang told china newsweek that developing the spicy chicken industry can not only increase the city's popularity and attract tourists, but also increase employment. he said: "whether it is raising chickens, making spicy chicken, or providing catering services, it can provide a lot of jobs and promote local employment."

it is understood that zaozhuang has rich historical culture and natural landscape resources. as a national 5a-level tourist attraction, taierzhuang ancient city has attracted a large number of tourists to visit. zeng gang said that if the zaozhuang spicy chicken ip can be "out of the circle", it will be good for the development of the local tourism industry.

in fact, zaozhuang has long had the idea of ​​developing the spicy chicken industry. for example, it has held spicy chicken cultural festivals many times, successfully applied for the title of "hometown of chinese spicy chicken", applied for the geographical indication trademark of "zaozhuang spicy chicken", and issued a development plan for the spicy chicken industry. in october 2020, the local government also publicly solicited suggestions for the development of the "zaozhuang spicy chicken industry in china" from home and abroad on how to expand, strengthen and prolong the spicy chicken industry chain.

however, local media have bluntly stated that zaozhuang spicy chicken, as a regional brand, is still in the stage of "catering without scale, consumption without industry, category without brand". compared with the well-known products in the province such as "dezhou braised chicken" and "dong'e ejiao", the brand still has considerable room for improvement.

in 2020, the zaozhuang municipal market supervision administration also mentioned in its response to the local cppcc member's "proposal on strengthening the regional brand of "zaozhuang spicy chicken" that through investigation, it was found that the brand building of zaozhuang spicy chicken is still in its infancy. although several companies have registered their own trademarks, the brand effect is poor. since "zaozhuang spicy chicken" has not been registered for a geographical indication, the brand effect cannot be formed, and its radiation and driving role has not been fully exerted.

wang xinquan believes that zaozhuang should continue to focus on brand, standards, culture, industry, sales, etc. in developing spicy chicken. "it is necessary to establish a corresponding food supply, production and processing, marketing, quality standards, talent training, product research and development, cultural construction, and policy support system." at the same time, he also believes that it is necessary to increase the intensity and precision of policy support.

it is worth mentioning that even if zaozhuang can "break out" with its spicy chicken, it still needs to face the possibility of "popularity but poor wealth". take harbin, which has gradually become popular since the end of last year, as an example. in the first half of this year, it became a "dark horse" in the cultural and tourism market, but the "overwhelming traffic" did not drive harbin's gdp to achieve rapid growth. according to the data, in the first half of this year, harbin's gdp totaled 249.26 billion yuan, an increase of 4.097 billion yuan, and a nominal growth rate of 1.67%, ranking low among the 15 sub-provincial cities in the country.

even zibo, which was popular all year last year, had a gdp of 456.1 billion yuan in 2023, an increase of 5.5%, lower than the average growth rate of 6% in shandong province. in the first half of this year, zibo's gdp was 238.15 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 5.1%, still lower than the provincial average.

niu fengrui, director of the institute of small and medium-sized cities and researcher at the chinese academy of social sciences, told china newsweek that becoming an "internet celebrity city" can enhance a city's image and popularity, especially for small and medium-sized cities. it can also promote the development of life service industries. however, "temporary internet celebrities may not be sustainable." the key to promoting a city's economic transformation and development lies in whether it is sustainable.

experts: we must open the door to development

zaozhuang prospered because of coal. it has a long history of coal mining and its coal quality is excellent. it is known as the "coal city of southern shandong".

after the 1950s, relying on rich coal resources and good location advantages, relevant state ministries and commissions successively established a number of large backbone enterprises in zaozhuang, including lunan fertilizer plant, lunan cement plant, and shiliquan power plant. zaozhuang has exported a total of 400 million tons of raw coal, more than 200 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity, and more than 6 million tons of fertilizers. zaozhuang's economic strength was once ranked among the top four in shandong province.

however, due to years of over-exploitation, zaozhuang's coal resources have been gradually depleted. by 1999, zaozhuang's coal was on the verge of exhaustion, and a large number of mines in zaozhuang, taozhuang, tiantun and other places were closed one after another. in 2009, zaozhuang was designated as a resource-depleted city, and in 2013 it was included in the list of key transformation cities for china's old industrial cities.

night view of zaozhuang stadium and gemini city plaza. photo/tuchong creative

like many resource-based cities, zaozhuang's economic development is gradually falling behind due to its single industrial structure and shrinking pillar industries. in 2023, zaozhuang's gdp was 215.674 billion yuan, the smallest economic scale among the 16 prefecture-level cities in shandong, and its per capita gdp and disposable income were far below the provincial average.

obviously, in the process of economic transformation, zaozhuang needs to find new growth points. zeng gang told china news weekly that the transformation of resource-depleted cities is a global problem, and so far, no very reliable solution has been found. therefore, it is "not that easy" for zaozhuang to achieve economic transformation.

in zeng gang's view, zaozhuang is not without opportunities to achieve transformation. zaozhuang is a national sustainable development agenda innovation demonstration zone approved by the state council. zeng gang, as an expert, has conducted research in the local area. he mentioned that as a national sustainable development agenda innovation demonstration zone, there are relevant policy support from the state council to shandong province. if the relevant policy support can be incubated, and the local area also has a certain industrial foundation, zaozhuang "still has relatively good conditions" to develop strategic emerging industries.

in fact, in recent years, zaozhuang has continued to implement the strategy of "industrially strengthening the city and developing the city through industry", cultivating and building high-end equipment, high-end chemicals and other characteristic and advantageous industries, and actively promoting the development of emerging industries. however, some people believe that due to the late start and weak foundation, emerging industries have not yet formed a strong support, and there is still a large gap compared with developed regions in the fields of new energy, new materials, and high-end equipment manufacturing.

to achieve economic structural transformation, the location of the city is also crucial. zeng gang said that zaozhuang is located at the junction of shandong and jiangsu. "it used to be said that it was not special to be 'neither south nor north', but now it can be said to be an advantage."

it is reported that zaozhuang is located at the golden middle node of the beijing-shanghai transportation artery. the beijing-shanghai high-speed ​​railway, beijing-taipei expressway and beijing-hangzhou grand canal pass through the territory. the radiation radius covers important economic circles such as beijing-tianjin-hebei and the yangtze river delta, and the transportation location advantage is significant.

zeng gang believes that the ecological environment is also one of zaozhuang's advantages. he said, "green water and green mountains are gold and silver mountains." in the past, many people did not understand this very well. now, the ecological environment has become a very favorable development advantage for some places. "if the ecological environment is good, it will actually attract some high-end industries and talents."

it is worth mentioning that zeng gang suggested that zaozhuang "still has a chance" to achieve economic transformation by opening up for development and making full use of external markets, capital, talents, technology, management, etc., combined with local resource advantages and industrial foundation.

in addition, zaozhuang is an important member of the huaihai economic zone. in recent years, the development of the huaihai economic zone has begun to accelerate. in march this year, "formulating the outline of the high-quality development plan for the huaihai economic zone" became one of the tasks to promote regional coordination and integrated development in the 2024 national economic and social development plan. actively integrating into the coordinated development pattern of the huaihai economic zone is considered to be one of the important ways for zaozhuang to achieve economic transformation and development.

zeng gang mentioned that the huaihai economic zone used to be a typical "marginal area" at the junction of provinces, with many administrative divisions and a low overall development level. but now, with the improvement of infrastructure such as transportation, these "marginal areas" are gradually becoming new growth poles with vitality. in his opinion, relevant cities can take advantage of their latecomer advantages, seize new opportunities for the development of emerging industries, strengthen cooperation around the industrial chain, and form industrial clusters.

niu fengrui said that transformation means pain. as resources are depleted, related industries will inevitably shrink and a new industrial system needs to be built. in his opinion, manufacturing should play a more dominant role in the economic structure transformation of resource-depleted cities.

he mentioned that agriculture is the foundation of the national economy, but agriculture does not have the function of accumulating material wealth from generation to generation; the service industry is divided into production-oriented services and life consumption-oriented services, and "internet celebrity cities" are more life consumption-oriented services, which raises the question of whether the passenger flow is sustainable.