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Shandong Hi-tech Boom
East China's Shandong Province will spend 600 million yuan (US$72.6 million) to establish a venture investment fund to motivate the province's high-tech industries.
The fund will help to speed up the application of new and high technologies, and it will be used for enterprises mainly involved in electronic information, biological engineering and new materials.
The fund will increase to 2 billion yuan (US$242 million) in three years.
The province has outlined its development blueprint for new and high-tech industries for the next five years.
"The venture investment fund will greatly fuel the development of the province's new and high-tech industries, which have seen fast growth in recent years," said Li Chuanting, governor of the province.
Li said the added value of the new and high-tech industries is expected to reach 20 per cent of that of the province's total industry by 2005.
By that time, the total income of the 10 new and high technology development zone will double that of the year 1999, Li added.
Shandong's new and high-tech industries, which are so far 1,220 in total, have expanded very quickly in the past five years. The companies have made more than 2,800 kinds of new and high technology products.
To date, six new pillar industries, including electronic information, biological engineering, oceanic engineering and environment protection, have taken shape in Shandong.
Among them, electronic information has taken the lead. Last year the industry made 65.6 billion yuan (US$7.9 billion) in industrial value.
Most of the new and high technology industries are located in major cities or coastal cities of the provinces. Ten of them, such as in cities of Qingdao, Yantai, Weihai and Weifang, have taken shape, and a total of 35 billion yuan (US$4.23 billion) has been spent on their construction.
The province will make greater input into the research and development for its new and high-tech industries in the future, Li said, adding that emphasis will still be on the three fields of electronics, biological engineering and new materials.
Li also urges more civil and overseas funds to invest in the high-tech industries.
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