The Xiongan New Area, about 100 km southwest of Beijing, celebrated its first anniversary, one year after Chinese President Xi Jinping announced the establishment of the new area on April 1, 2017. It is the third new area of national significance after the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone and the Shanghai Pudong New Area. The Xiongan New Area is being forged into a new benchmark economic zone that will be domestically and globally influential, Chinese analysts said. Xiongan is designed to help the coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region and relieve pressure on Beijing by removing some functions that are not essential to a capital city, including some administrative and public institutions, company headquarters, financial institutions, higher education institutions and sci-tech units. Xiongan is expected to explore a novel growth model that differs from the traditional development path of cities, Tian Yun, Director of the China Society of Macroeconomics Research Center, told the Global Times. The development of the new area is considered to be “a crucial strategy for the next millennium,” setting new standards for the building of model economic zones, Tian added.

In less than four months, construction of the new Xiongan Public Services Center, including eight separate buildings, was completed, and since last autumn 260,000 trees have been planted. A further 15 million trees will be added this year. The total planned forest area will reach 67,000 hectares, one-third of the Xiongan New Area. Together with the wetland of Baiyangdian, 70% of the new area will be covered with water or trees. In building the Xiongan center, workers reduced construction waste by 80%. Facilities are built to collect and purify rainfall, and workers used more than 30 new environmentally friendly construction technologies. “High-tech, energy-saving, and environmentally friendly are the foundations on which Xiongan is built,” said Ye Jian, a technological supervisor of the project.

During the past year, 19 high-tech companies, including Alibaba and Baidu, have signed cooperation agreements with the Xiongan Management Committee, and more than 100 high-tech companies have obtained a commerce registration in Xiongan. Construction on the 93 km railway between Beijing and Xiongan began on February 28. Travel time will be cut to 30 minutes from the current 80 minutes. Ultimately the Xiongan New Area is projected to cover 2,000 square kilometers with a population of 2 million to 2.5 million.