China's Hebei achieves outstanding performance over past decade

SHIJIAZHUANG, Aug. 11 (Xinhua) -- North China's Hebei Province has made outstanding achievements over the past decade, according to a press briefing earlier this week.

Over the past 10 years, Hebei's GDP increased from 2.3 trillion yuan (about 340.5 billion U.S. dollars) in 2012 to more than 4 trillion yuan in 2021, said Ni Yuefeng, secretary of the Hebei Provincial Committee of the Communist Party of China, at the press briefing on Tuesday.

The energy consumption per unit of GDP dropped by 43 percent over the period, Ni added.

According to Ni, Hebei has overfulfilled the task of cutting overcapacity in six industries of steel, coal, cement, plate glass, coking coal and thermal power.

The province's steel production capacity has been reduced from 320 million tonnes at its peak to less than 200 million tonnes, while the development of strategic emerging industries and modern service industries is accelerating, Ni added.

"The coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, the planning and construction of the Xiongan New Area and the Beijing Winter Olympics have brought golden opportunities to Hebei's development," Ni said.

Meanwhile, all 2.3 million impoverished residents in Hebei were lifted out of poverty in the past decade. The per capita disposable income of rural residents in the province increased 1.2 times from 8,081 yuan in 2012 to 18,179 yuan in 2021.

From 2013 to 2021, the average PM2.5 concentration in Hebei dropped from 104 to 38.8 micrograms per cubic meter, the days with good air quality increased from 149 to 269, and heavy pollution days decreased from 73 to nine, said Wang Zhengpu, the province's governor.

Wang noted that Hebei would further promote high-level protection of the ecological environment and high-quality economic development in a coordinated manner, making the environment even better.