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West China Areas Join Hands for DevelopmentThe provinces and autonomous regions of western China are planning to join hands in efforts toward larger-scale development.At a recent high-level conference in Chongqing Municipality, leading officials from western China called on the 10 provinces and regions of the west to enhance coordination and cooperation in order to avoid unhealthy competition and achieve sustained economic growth. A Chongqing official said the city has proposed some projects involving ecological protection, the development of mineral and tourist resources, farm produce, and infrastructure projects. He said that most of these projects could involve cooperation among provinces and regions in the west. He Guoqiang, secretary of the Chongqing Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China, said that as an industrial base, Chongqing will take advantage of its favorable conditions to serve its neighboring western provinces and regions to jointly form a large economic ring for further development in the new century. He said, "Chongqing will support all projects which benefit the development of the west, even if they bring little benefit to Chongqing." China has recently invested heavily in a number of infrastructure projects in the west, including the Guizhou- Chongqing-Hunan Railway and the Sichuan-Chongqing Express Railway. Construction of a railway from southwest China to Tibet will start soon, and a Lanzhou-Chongqing railway running through several ethnic minority areas in Sichuan Province is now being designed. Inter-provincial projects calling for joint efforts will benefit the exploitation of resources and promote exchange of commodities and personnel in the west. In the area of expressway construction, Shaanxi is planning to create tunnels through the Qinling Mountains for highways connecting Shaanxi and Sichuan. A thoroughfare to the South China Sea from Shaanxi to Guangxi is planned, and is expected to open to traffic in five years. The 10 western areas targeted for development are Shaanxi, Gansu, and Qinghai provinces, and the Ningxia Hui and Xinjiang Uygur autonomous regions in the northwest, Sichuan, Guizhou and Yunnan provinces, and Chongqing Municipality and the Tibet Autonomous Region in the southwest. They are now mapping out their respective blueprints, and all have placed economic development and environmental protection at the top of their agendas. Specialists say if the western areas join hands in development, this can ensure environmental protection, and educational, scientific and technological cooperation. Sichuan, Yunnan, Guizhou, Chongqing, and Qinghai will cooperate in an environmental protection program on the upper reach of the Yangtze River next year. To alleviate the pressure on oil supplies in central and eastern China, a 1,200-km-long oil pipe line will be installed with an annual oil transfer capacity of 5 million tons. Electricity and gas in the west are also expected to be transmitted to east China. Now there are a few economic belts which have emerged in Chengdu-Chongqing area, Guanzhong Basin in Shaanxi and Hexi Corridor in Gansu. With economic centers such as Xi'an, Chengdu, Chongqing and Lanzhou, the large-scale development in the west is promising. Economists noted that the joint efforts in the development of west represent a new concept of economic growth that will undoubtedly be helpful for implementation of the state's strategy of great development for western China.
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