Looking to the Sea for Riches

By WANG JUN

Looking to the Sea for Riches

By WANG JUN

Coastal Shandong Province is exploring offshore to find new economic growth points

If left unprocessed, 10 tons of codfish skins sell for only 14,000 yuan ($2,215).However, Shandong Oriental Ocean Sci-Tech Co. Ltd., by cooperating with Yantai Institute of Coastal Zone Research aff i liated to the Chinese Academy of Sciences(CAS), can turn 14,000 yuan into 400,000 yuan ($63,000) by using the fish skins to produce collagen proteins. This in turn can be processed into high-end health foods worth 12.5 million yuan ($1.98 million).

Examples of Shandong Province’s exploitation of its marine resources were seen at the 2011 Qingdao International Blue Economy Summit Forum held on October 28-29.

Al Bryant, Vice President of Boeing Research and Technology in China, said his company has established a research project of extracting fuels from seaweed by cooperating with the Institute of Oceanology of the CAS in Qingdao. A commercial platform that produces biofuel by using seaweed is under construction in the city.

Bryant said a Chinese aircraft using biofuel had launched the first test flight on October 28 and the biofuel industry is expected to realize scale production by 2020. At that time, 30 percent of the fuels in the Chinese aviation industry will be biofuels.

From land to ocean

“Experiencing the previous round of economic growth, China’s coastal areas face slowed growth and many eastern provinces are looking for new growth points. With most land resources already exploited, the marine economy naturally has become the only option to expand that growth for the coastal regions,” said Gao Ruxi, professor at Antai College of Economics and Management of Shanghai Jiao Tong University.

Coastal areas should not compete for resources with inland areas in the central and western regions, since coastal areas themselves have abundant marine resources.

“The regional development in China should be extended to the ocean and we should make overall planning for both land and marine development,” said Chang Xiuze,professor at the Academy of Macroeconomic Research of the National Development and Reform Commission.

According to the Statistical Communiqué on Marine Economy of China 2010 compiled by the State Oceanic Administration (SOA),China’s gross product of the marine economy totaled 3.84 trillion yuan ($607.59 billion) in 2010, a year-on-year increase of 12.8 percent,higher than the 10.3-percent GDP growth in the country. The marine economy contributed 9.7 percent to China’s 2010 GDP, much higher than the 4 percent in 2006.

China has strengthened construction of the blue economy and approved several regional development plans for that economy.On January 4, the State Council approved the Development Planning for Shandong Peninsula Blue Economic Zone as part of the national development strategy.

It is the country’s fi rst regional development strategy of the blue economy and the fi rst national-level development strategy approved in the beginning year of the 12th Five-Year Plan (2011-15). According to the plan,Shandong Province will coordinate the development of its land and marine economies and strengthen emerging marine industries.

The State Council also approved the Planning for the Zhejiang Oceanic Economy Development Demonstration Area in March and the Development Planning for Guangdong Oceanic Economy Comprehensive Experimental Area in July.

Shandong’s advantages

Shandong peninsula—with a coast line of 3,345 km and more than 200 bays, 50 of which can be turned into ports that can handle 10,000 tons or more—is the biggest in China.There are more than 320 islands whose area is above 500 square meters, most of which are not yet developed.

According to the Development Planning for Shandong Peninsula Blue Economic Zone, all offshore waters of Shandong Province with an area of 159,500 square km are covered in the economic zone. It also covers 64,000 square km of land that includes six cities—Qingdao, Dongying, Yantai,Weifang, Weihai, Rizhao—and two coastal counties in Binzhou. In 2010, this zone had a population of 33.15 million and a GDP of 1.87 trillion yuan ($295.89 billion).

“In the first half of this year, the Shandong Peninsula Blue Economic Zone had a GDP of 1.04 trillion yuan ($164.56 billion), up 11.7 percent compared with the same period last year,” said Jiang Daming,Governor of Shandong Province, at the forum.

Compared with Zhejiang and Guangdong provinces, Shandong has marked advantages in marine science and technology. According to Jiang, the province has the strongest strength of marine scienti fi c research in the country.

Jiang said Shandong is home to nearly 60 marine-related research and educational institutions at both national and provincial levels, accounting for more than 70 percent of the country’s total, including the Ocean University of China and Institute of Oceanology of CAS. More than 60 percent of the country’s senior researchers of marine science are in Shandong, including 23 academicians of the CAS and the Chinese Academy of Engineering (CAE).

The province also has world leading technologies in marine disaster monitoring and forecasting, marine erosion protection,breeding of aquatic varieties, extraction of marine active substances, marine microalgae energy and sea cell fiber. The technologies of marine pharmacy based on biochemical engineering, enzyme engineering and cell engineering are also at the national advanced level.

“Centering on constructing a modern oceanic industrial cluster of strong international competitiveness, the Development Planning for Shandong Peninsula Blue Economic Zone has selected 14 industries to give priority, such as modern fi shing industry,marine bio industry, marine energy and minerals, marine transportation and logistics and marine cultural tourism,” Jiang said.

Qingdao’s role

NEXT TOP PORT:The Qingdao port, founded in 1892,is the world’s 10th largest port in terms of annual handling capacity

Located in the south of Shandong Province and with South Korea just across the Yellow Sea, the city of Qingdao has a coastline of 711 km, 69 islands and 49 natural harbors. According to Li Qun, Mayor of Qingdao, the city’s economic volume accounts for 30 percent of the total of the Shandong Peninsula Blue Economic Zone,and its output value of marine industries contributes 25 percent to the entire zone. More than 50 percent of the national-level oceanrelated scienti fi c research projects are carried out by Qingdao.

Liu Mingjun, Director of the Qingdao Municipal Development and Reform Commission, said the city has 28 marine research institutes, more than one third of the country’s total, and 20 key laboratories at the ministerial level. It has 19 CAS and CAE academicians.

In 2010, Qingdao’s marine-related industries had an output value of 168.3 billion yuan ($26.63 billion), up 17.43 percent year on year, and the output value in marine equipment manufacturing reached 35 billion yuan($5.54 billion).

Liu said by 2015 the city will achieve added value of 115 billion yuan ($18.2 billion) for its marine industries, and by 2020,the fi gure will be 220 billion yuan ($34.81 billion), with an annual growth rate of 14 percent.

According to Liu, there will be some major projects in the city for construction of the Shandong Peninsula Blue Economic Zone, such as Dongjiakou port area. Figures from the Dongjiakou port area show that with a planned area of 70 square km, Dongjiakou port area, one of the four sections for Qingdao Port, is the biggest single port area of China,with a total coastal line of 35.7 km. The 112 planned berths are all deep-water berths, with an aggregate handling capacity of 370 million tons. Of the total, the three specially planned extra large ore berths and three extra large oil berths will fi ll a gap in the capability of berthing extra large ships in China and will help the port to be the world’s most ef fi cient one with the lowest transportation cost.

The rapidly improved infrastructure has attracted many renowned companies from home and abroad. According to figures from the port, 19 large companies have established projects in the port, including Sinopec Group, Mercuria Energy Group Ltd., China Huaneng Group, China Datang Corp. and Suez Group. Large state-owned enterprises and global Fortune 500 companies have invested in nine projects in the port. Investment of all the projects in the port area has totaled 70 billion yuan ($11.08 billion), which can bring cargo handling capacity to more than 100 million tons.