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Private economy has become a major engine of growth in Shantou, one of China's five special economic zones (SEZ), in Guangdong Province.
Statistics released by local industrial and commercial departments show that the first 11 months of 2002 saw 8,011 privately-owned enterprises established with their registered capital and employees totaling 11.04 billion yuan (about 1.33 billion US dollars) and 81,500 respectively.
The city also has 29 privately-owned enterprise groups, of which three have been listed among the country's 500 biggest private enterprises.
Although technically advanced sectors like electronic, chemical and pharmacy are still dominated by state-owned enterprises, private enterprises have become a main force in other spheres like trade, food processing, textile, audio-visual products, toys, works of art and daily consumables of light industry.
What's more, a number of them have abandoned their past practice of stressing trade and neglecting manufacturing to expand their competitive edge and business stamina.
In 2002, the city's manufacturing private enterprises totaled 2,497, up 13.8 percent over 2001. The number of tech-intensive private enterprises reached 349, up 172.7 percent year-on-year, and that of foreign-oriented enterprises was 311, up 22.9 percent.
With their tax payments reaching 630 million yuan (about US$75.9 million) last year, private enterprises have also become an important source of the local government's financial revenue.
(Xinhua News Agency February 11, 2003)
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