1 year on, Hainan grows with exponential foreign capital use

One year since the master plan for the Hainan Free Trade Port was released, the island province has seen its GDP rise, along with an exponential jump in foreign capital use, and with fixed asset investment and retail sales of consumer goods and other major economic indicators also maintaining rapid growth.

Aerial photo of Haikou, capital of Hainan Province and a core city for the development of the Hainan Free Trade Port. (Photo by Liu Yang/Hinews)

The GDP topped 288.59 billion yuan ($44.51 billion) in the first half of this year, up 17.5 percent year on year, Hainan Bureau of Statistics Deputy Director Wang Yu said at a press conference in Haikou on July 20. 

Fixed asset investment in the same period grew 20.7 percent year on year. The total retail sales of consumer goods reached 117.04 billion yuan ($18.05 billion), up 46.4 percent year on year.

The Hainan Free Trade Port has been leveraging the use of foreign capital. In the first half of the year, actual utilized foreign capital topped $950 million, up 623.6 percent year on year.

Hainan’s investment structure has been optimized after three major adjustments for high-quality development. Wang said the service industry and high and new technology industry, two of the three major industries to be developed across the island, have also shown a good momentum.

The service sector accounted for 61.5 percent of the local economy in the first half of this year, up from 58.6 percent in the same period last year. Investment in high-tech industries increased by 77.3 percent year on year.

The Hainan Free Trade Port master plan, released on June 1, 2020, aims to develop the province into a globally influential high-level free trade port by the middle of the century.