Shanghai aims to work on FTZ to deepen reforms

Shanghai will continue to develop the pilot free trade zone next year as part of efforts to deepen reforms and sustain the city's economic growth, the city's Party Secretary Han Zheng said yesterday.

The move is also to help the city adjust to a state of new normal of slower economic growth but better industrial structure, Han told a plenary meeting of the Communist Party Shanghai Committee.

"We must adapt ourselves to these new conditions," Han said.

"Next year is the final year of the 12th Five-Year (2011-2015) Plan period, and the mission of reform will be even more demanding," he said. "We should set practical goals and keep better balance between reform and growth."

The city's Mayor Yang Xiong also told the meeting that Shanghai's overall economic growth is expected to reach 7 percent this year.

In the first three quarters of this year, Shanghai's gross domestic product grew 7 percent year on year, compared with 7.1 percent in the first half and 7 percent in the first three months.

The China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone is still considered a core trial in the city's reform and opening-up.

Next year, the zone's agenda includes further work on convertibility under the capital account, interest rate liberalization, opening the financial services sector to private firms and foreign investors, and improving financial regulations.

"It will be a big step forward," Han said. "Such an agenda fits into Shanghai's target of growing into a global center of finance and trade, and will serve as a stabilizer for the city's economy."

This year, the FTZ renewed the negative list and streamlined the administration of foreign investment.