A clean city

Apart from the talent pool, Chengdu is trying to build itself into a place that is suitable to live in.

Ge is proud that nearly all foreign embassies have situated their offices in western China in Chengdu. 'They chose it because they feel comfortable living here,' he explains, adding that Chengdu aims to be one of the cleanest cities in China.

Thanks to the construction of Dujiangyan, the world's oldest irrigation project still in operation, the Chengdu Plain is known as the 'land of abundance'. [China Daily]

According to Ge, almost all the buses and taxies in the city burn gas instead of oil to reduce pollution. By 2009, the city expects to safely burn all the rubbish, instead of using landfills. It has also moved major factories out of the city, and is generating electricity with water, instead of burning coal.

In 2007, the city government spent more than 5 billion yuan to build over 30 sewage water processing facilities. Efforts to improve air quality have also paid off: 311 days last year had good air quality. The egret, a rare bird that had long been unseen in the city due to heavy pollution, has recently returned, according to a CCTV report.

'We want to be the city with the best environment in China, and I think we are well on the way to achieving this,' Ge says.

The city's GDP reached 332 billion yuan in 2007, up 15.8 percent year-on-year, while the per capita income of urban residents surpassed $4,000. Ge aims to increase the disposable income of urban residents by 8 percent, and rural residents by 10 percent annually.

Ge says strong foundations have already been laid, and that Chengdu's future looks bright.

'When you have the human resources and a suitable place for people to live, enterprises will come and see whether there is a market here for them,' Ge says.

(China Daily August 5, 2008)