Giant billboard reads, welcome Lanshang (a phrase referring to business people native to Pingtan who is working outside) to return home to start a business.

Pingtan, an island city off E China’s Fujian province, is in the midst of rapid development and booming construction. Pingtan, also the closest place on the Chinese mainland to the island of Taiwan, has been designated as a special zone for piloting cross-Straits integration across the board, as a pilot free trade zone, and as the second international tourism island in the country.

For decades, Pingtan’s businesspeople have earned their hometown’s reputations as a home to tunneling and shipping.

In 2018, Pingtan launched a campaign, calling for the businesspeople who struggle outside to return home. Up to now, 78 related projects have been signed, with a total investment of 51.694 billion yuan in Pingtan.

[Photo by Nian Wangshu]

Pingtan held a convention again to share opportunities and seek common development on July 19. Present were overseas Chinese businesspeople from home and abroad, representatives from well-known enterprises from Taiwan, Lanshang, and representatives from relevant associations and chambers of commerce.

Recently, reporters from Pingtan Convergence Media Center visited ZL Offshore, a company specializing in ocean engineering and saw a host of honorary certificates on a wall, a testimony of Lanshang’s achievements outside. Chen Ruixi, chairman of the company said, “I am a native of Pingtan. The island city is rich in marine resources, and needs professionals and equipment to develop the marine economy. It’s my unshirkable responsibility to contribute.”

After returning to Pingtan, Chen spared no effort for the development of his hometown, leading the company to innovate. For more than two years, the company has been recognized as a headquarters economy enterprise and a technology-based enterprise.

Since the campaign, Pingtan has set up a task force and rolled out a slew of incentives in a bid to pick up the pace of homecoming merchants. In June this year, the Ministry of Finance and the State Taxation Administration issued a circular on an extension of favorable policy on corporate income tax of 15 percent in Pingtan, becoming the most preferential of its kind in East China except Hainan province. “I have full confidence in the future of my hometown,” said Gao Juquan, president of Pingtan Shipowners’ Association.

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