Port city banks on cutting-edge technology for industry upgrade and better growth

Ningbo, a port city in East China's Zhejiang province, has been harnessing opportunities from advanced technologies and globalization to transform and upgrade its traditional sectors, bolstering the city's high-quality development.

The city on China's eastern coast, which is one of the economic hubs in the Yangtze River Delta, recently rolled out a plan to double its current foreign trade volume by 2025, allowing both its imports and exports to each hit 1 trillion yuan ($142.1 billion).

Ningbo has a solid foundation in traditional manufacturing industries such as textiles, chemical engineering, auto parts, rubber and plastic goods. Those industries have been a major engine for its economic growth for years. The city is one of the province's economic powerhouses.

A Joyson Electronics employee conducts safety checks on products at the company facility in Ningbo, Zhejiang province. [Provided to China Daily] 

In the first nine months of 2019, the value-added of enterprises above their designated size, which means an enterprise with annual revenue of more than $2.85 million, from Ningbo's nine traditional manufacturing industries witnessed a year-on-year growth of 8.5 percent. The research and development expenditure of those enterprises increased by 14.7 percent.

Since Zhejiang mapped out a plan to accelerate the transformation and upgrading of its traditional manufacturing sector in 2017, Ningbo has been seeking ways to achieve intelligent transformation, innovative development and the further opening-up of traditional industries.

Targeting industries with a competitive edge nationwide, the city put the intelligent transformation of traditional manufacturing as its first priority with the aim of improving manufacturers' core competitiveness and their ability for sustainable development.