As it continues to grow, Nantong is building a 17-square-kilometer central innovation zone in its downtown area to attract innovative projects from Shanghai and become the new center of the city.

Nantong has more than 5,000 industrial enterprises that have annual revenue above 20 million yuan, and over 1,000 high-tech enterprises.

The city has five national-level and 13 provincial-level development parks and zones. The Nantong Economic and Technical Development Zone is one of the first batch of 14 national-level zones of its kind.

The Haian development zone in the city has a whole industrial-chain cluster for the robot industry; the Rugao development zone is now a new-energy auto industrial center; the Haimen development zone plans to become an equipment manufacturing center for luxurious passenger cruises with an annual output value of more than 200 billion yuan.

Nantong's Qidong life and health technology city is already attracting gene detection, biomedicine and health industries from Shanghai, as its land costs are one fifth of that of the Zhangjiang Science and Technology Park of Shanghai, and it is 50 minutes away by car.

The city attaches great importance to the 585-sq-km port-vicinity industrial zone to develop advanced manufacturing industries, ocean economy and holiday-related industry.

The city has four first-class national-level ports, 289 quay berths and three deep-water channels for ships of 50,000 metric tons and above. Nantong's annual cargo handling capacity is over 200 million tons, and its Yangkou port, which has handled more than 150 LNG ships, is an important clean energy supply center for the Yangtze River Delta.

Clockwise from top: The Shanghai-Nantong Bridge under construction. Ships carry goods near a wharf in Nantong. Yuan Songcheng / For China Daily The city shines in the foreground of the Yangtze at night. Sun Jian / For China Daily

(China Daily 05/19/2018 page12)