According to a report by Yicai, there are seven cities in China recorded GDP of over RMB2 trillion (US$294.4 billion) last year. The cities in the two-trillion yuan club are Shanghai, Beijing, Shenzhen, Guangzhou, Chongqing, Suzhou, and Chengdu.
These cities have experienced economic rebound in 2022 and are expecting an even stronger rebound in 2023 due to lower base year in 2022.
At a news conference on January 3, Chengdu of Sichuan province also announced that its GDP has surpassed RMB2 trillion for the first time in 2022.
Whereas Suzhou of Jiangsu province expected its GDP to reach RMB 2.4 trillion in 2022, according to its government work report released on Jan 7. The city has set its 2023 economic target at 5%, and it is not hard to know why. A city with 13,400 high-tech companies, 340,000 high-level talents, and 241 listed companies in 2022.
Meanwhile Wuhan expects a 4.5% growth in GDP last year to a total of RMB1.9 trillion. According to latest statistics, Wuhan had 3,000 new high-tech enterprises, with fixed asset investment rising 11 percent in 2022.
Given that the economic growth is gaining traction, many cities with a GDP of over RMB1 trillion have set 2023 growth target at around 5 to 7 percent. For example, Fuzhou in Fujian province and Hefei in Anhui province have all set GDP target at 6.5 percent in 2023.
Guangzhou and Suzhou, on the other hand, expect their GDP to grow 6 and 5 percent this year, respectively.
“Given the comparatively low base in 2022, economic growth rate of the cities in 2023 will be significantly higher than that of 2022, as the optimization of pandemic prevention and control measures come into effect in December,” executive chairman of the Guangdong Society of Economic Reform, Peng Peng remarked.
“Boosting domestic consumption, as well as increasing investment in public facilities is important to economic rebound in 2023,” Peng concluded.
