Report on “In-House meeting with 6-Member Delegation from China Special Economic Zone Think Tank”

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The Institute of Strategic Studies Islamabad (ISSI) hosted a delegation from China Special Economic Zone Think Tank on June 8, 2017. The delegation was led by Mr. Wu Sikang, Director, Development Research Centre of Shenzhen Municipal People’s Government, Guangdong Province. Other members of the delegation included: Mr. Wang Chao, Researcher & Deputy Director General, Human Resources & Social Security Administration, Pingshan District Government, Shenzhen; Mr. Huang Hucheng, Deputy Chief of General Affairs Division; Ms. Xia Yanna, Chairman Huazhi, Shenzhen Ltd.; Ms. Zhang Weiju, Chairman of ADTECH (Shenzhen) Technology Co. Ltd.; and Ms. Yang Ya, Chairman of Lian Suo (Shenzhen) Education Investment Management Ltd.

The delegation expressed its interest in discussing vocational education, development of innovation industry, and how to help Pakistan foster intelligent manufacturing talent.

Welcoming the delegation, Ambassador Khalid Mahmood, Chairman ISSI said that China has a very successful experience in the establishment of Special Economic Zones (SEZs) domestically. The first fours economic zones in early 1980s were very successful. Now the number of SEZs in China, of different kinds, exceed 1750. He said that Shenzhen started developing a Special Economic Zone in 1991. Recently, a delegation from ISSI visited Shenzhen again, and we were impressed by the phenomenal progress in terms if industry, import-export and technology. We also learnt that there are certain prerequisites for having a successful economic zone. A basic prerequisite is to attract domestic and foreign sources of investment. For that, one needs to give incentives such as tax exemption, as well as provision of basic utilities like gas, means of communication, banking system and water, which, in other words, means building a friendly environment based on transparency. And, of course, security comes on top of it all.

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