The 20th plenary session of the Yangtze River Delta Cities' Economic Cooperation Committee was held in the city of Lianyungang, Jiangsu province on Sept 16.

The committee's 19th session, which began in October 2019, has included officials from all 41 cities (prefecture-level and above) across the Yangtze River Delta region, which consists of the provinces of Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Anhui, as well as Shanghai municipality.

Agreements on 19 major cooperation projects were signed on site, further integrating industrial chains throughout the YRD region.

AUX Group, headquartered in Ningbo, Zhejiang province, signed a 10-billion-yuan ($1.48 billion) investment agreement with the local government to build an intelligent air conditioning production base in Dangtu county, Maanshan, Anhui province.

In addition, a national-level technology transfer center will be built in the Hangzhou High-Tech Zone (Binjiang) by the Hangzhou municipal government and the Shanghai branch of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Many YRD cities have made significant progress integrating into the region over the past year. For example, the Shaoxing Intercity Railway was extended into Hangzhou, Zhejiang province in July, connecting the city's metro system with that of Shaoxing, another city in Zhejiang. Nanjing, capital of Jiangsu province, is taking a series of measures to accelerate its economic integration with two neighboring Anhui cities –  Maanshan and Chuzhou.

"The increased mobility of production resources will accelerate the high-quality development of city clusters," said an official from the development and reform commission in Shanghai's Jiading district.