Hefei High-tech Zone was approved as a national foreign trade transformation and upgrading base
A few days ago, the Ministry of Commerce of the People's Republic of China announced the list of national foreign trade transformation and upgrading bases in 2021. Hefei High-tech Zone passed the assessment and was identified as the national foreign trade transformation and upgrading base (home appliances).
The National Foreign Trade Transformation and Upgrading Base is an important platform for opening to the outside world recognized by the organization led by the Ministry of Commerce. It is an industrial cluster that integrates production and export functions and is supported and developed by the state. It is an important carrier for cultivating new advantages in export competition such as information, marketing, brand, quality, technology, standards, and services. It is an important starting point for promoting the transformation of foreign trade development mode and optimizing the structure of export commodities, and an important driving force for achieving stable and coordinated export development. Strengthening the construction of bases will help stabilize and unblock the foreign trade industry chain and supply chain, and promote the high-quality development of trade. Relevant national departments will provide policy support and tilt from various aspects such as funding, credit, export credit insurance, and public service platform construction.

It is understood that the high-tech zone is now gathering 4 core home appliance enterprises, there are more than 150 home appliance supporting enterprises and 30 home appliance enterprises above designated size. A group of industry leaders with high technical level and strong brand influence, such as Gree, Midea, and Whirlpool, have been initially formed. Lingda, Century Jingxin, Kaibang, Lishitong, etc. have strong R&D capabilities and a wide range of supporting facilities. Supported by enterprises, a circular industrial chain integrating R&D, production, sales, logistics and related supporting enterprise clusters, Products cover white series home appliances such as air conditioners, washing machines, refrigerators, and smart small home appliances.

In recent years, Hefei High-tech Zone has aimed to improve the development quality, efficiency and core competitiveness of the home appliance industry. Strengthen innovation, promote transformation, help go overseas, and make every effort to build a smart home appliance industry system with optimized structure, advanced technology and high added value. The output value of the home appliance industry has shown double-digit growth for many years. At present, the base home appliance and parts companies have established more than 1,000 sales and service outlets at home and abroad, covering more than 200 countries and regions around the world, completing the international market layout of Central and South America, Africa, the Middle East, ASEAN and Eastern Europe. In the past three years, the import and export volume of regulated home appliance companies reached 616 million US dollars, 636 million US dollars, and 794 million US dollars, respectively, up 33%, 3%, and 25% year-on-year.

The identification of a national-level foreign trade transformation and upgrading base is an important achievement of the Hefei High-tech Zone in accelerating the construction and opening up to the outside world. This golden sign is conducive to giving play to the leading role of the industry, highlighting the advantages of the coordinated development of the home appliance industry chain, and promoting the development of regional foreign trade in Hefei High-tech Zone into a new stage.
Graphic source: Hefei High-tech Release