From Overseas Press

China's "miracle" Shenzhen marks 30 years

(chinadaily.com.cn)
Updated: 2010-09-09 10:22

China's Shenzhen was hailed as a "miracle" by President Hu Jintao Monday when the southern export hub marked its 30 years of reforms. They city "provided the blueprint for the country's economic rebirth," said an article in AFP on Sep 6.

Hu said that "The Shenzhen Special Economic Zone created a miracle in the world's history of industrialization urbanization and modernization and has contributed significantly to China's opening up and reform." "The central government will, as always, support the brave exploration of the special economic zone as well as its role of testing and carrying out reform ahead of others," added Hu.

The city, once a sleepy fishing village, is widely "viewed as the cradle of China's dramatic transformation into a world economic and trade juggernaut," according to the article.

Under reforms pioneered by late paramount leader Deng Xiaoping, Shenzhen became the "first area in China to be designated as a special economic zone that could accept foreign investment in August of 1980.

The city offered "lower taxes and less red tape to attract the overseas investors whose factories-staffed by China's abundant cheap labor-set the mould for the country's explosive manufacturing-based economic growth."

According to government figures, the city's annual economic growth rate was 25.8 percent over the past 30 years, compared with about 9.8 percent for the entire country. Its population has reached to nearly nine million, most of them are migrant workers. The area has been expanded about five-fold to just under 2,000 square kilometers this year, nearly the size of Luxembourg. Shenzhen boasts one of the highest minimum wages in China at 1,100 yuan (160 dollars) per month.

Wang Rong, the Communist Party chief of Shenzhen, said that "the city would continue to act as a trail-blazer for the nation, and would build itself into a modern and international metropolis."