A number of 144 foreign and domestic investment projects worth more than $6.3 billion were signed in Zhongshan, Guangdong province, on Wednesday, during a local investment and trade fair.

The investments are mainly engaged in emerging and hi-tech sectors including high-end equipment manufacturing, health and medicine, new materials and new energy, according to the local government.

In trade, about 2,000 export deals worth nearly $4 billion were also signed.

The annual Zhonghan Investment and Trade Fair, which was held on Wednesday, attracted about 600 foreign business representatives from 42 countries and regions.

Zhongshan, birthplace of China's late revolutionary leader Sun Yat-sen, has become a traditional manufacturing and trade hub in the prosperous Pearl River Delta since China's reform and opening up in the 1980s.

"We are aiming high-end investment projects to help upgrade the traditional manufacturing industry," said Xue Xiaofeng, Party chief of Zhongshan.

According to Xue, a China-Europe industrial zone has been planned in Zhongshan, with a designated area focusing on development of health and medicine and precise machinery manufacturing.