Xiamen tops national Reform Heat Index

Last week, a LNG-powered ro-ro ship with the largest cargo capacity in the world stopped at Xiamen Dongdu Terminal. The SAIC Anji Sincerity is a 200-meter roll-on/roll-off ship that features 7,600 vehicle slots and a displacement of over 40,000 tons. Owned by a subsidiary of the SAIC Motor Corporation, the vessel loaded more than 3,700 vehicles in Xiamen and set sail to Europe, marking the largest single shipment of autos from Xiamen Port.

Morten Wierod, the president of the Electrification Business Area of the Group Executive Committee of ABB Limited, recently visited Xiamen to announce an additional investment of $100 million in China over the next three years. Since its establishment in 1992, Xiamen ABB Switchgear Company has become one of the largest manufacturing bases for ABB globally. The subsidiary generated a revenue of 10 billion yuan last year.

Marine biologists spotted on January 24 a pod of Chinese white dolphins near Huoshaoyu off the coast of Xiamen. Classified as a national first-class protected species, the Indo-Pacific humpback dolphin is regarded as an indicative species for marine ecological health because of its sensitivity to water quality. 

The population of Chinese white dolphins in the waters of Xiamen stand at roughly 80, up from 60 dolphins in the early 1990s. Xiamen is the only Chinese city from which Indo-Pacific humpback dolphins can be seen from an urban area.

The city of Xiamen earlier this month launched a shopping festival entitled the Xiamen Citywide Shopping Spree. Municipal departments including the local commerce bureau planned a series of events including hundreds of online and offline promotional activities. 

Xiamen officials distributed nearly ten million yuan in consumer vouchers and established a New Year themed platform designed to boost consumption during the holiday season.

The Xiamen Digital Port Platform officially debuted earlier this month. The platform is built upon the Xiamen International Trade “Single Window” platform. It offers more than 200 application services in areas such as maritime transport, air transport and bonded operations. The new service is expected to help enterprises increase their operational efficiency by as much as 50 percent and to save a collective 150 million yuan annually.

The official Spring Festival travel season began last Friday. XiamenAir is set to operate more than 23,700 flights during the holiday season, up 36 percent year-on-year. The airline introduced additional routes and increased the frequency of service throughout its flight network.

The Ministry of Ecology and Environment last month released its national environmental air quality status rankings for 2023. Air quality in Xiamen ranked 6th among 168 key cities for the full year and ranked seventh for the month of December.