Pengzhou, a county-level city in Southwest China's Sichuan province, has built friendly cooperation ties, or sister-city relationships, with 11 foreign cities, including Ipswich in Australia, M??rzzuschlag in Austria, and Vercelli in Italy, ranking it first in Sichuan province in terms of the total number of sister-city relationships established.

In a recent move, the city agreed on a series of measures designed to boost growth through international cooperation at a meeting with a French delegation on May 19.

Han Yi, Party chief of Pengzhou, along with other local government officials, met with a visiting mission from Seineet-Marne in France's Ilede-France region, to discuss possible cooperation in the fields of tourism, trade, culture, agriculture and environmental protection.

The meeting was concluded with the signing of a memorandum of friendly cooperation, which will lead to the establishment of an official cooperation relationship between the two sides in 2017, and will see Seine-et-Marne become Pengzhou's 11th foreign partner town in the same year.

Jean-Jacques Barbaux, president of the general council of Seineet-Marne and head of the French delegation, was impressed by both Pengzhou's natural environment and its development potential.

"Pengzhou is both a young and old city," he said. "It has 4,000 years' history as well as fashionable modern styles. Bailu town in Pengzhou is very French, and makes us feel at home and comfortable. There is a Chinese saying that though they are born a thousand miles apart, souls which are one shall meet."

Bailu town established a friendly cooperation relationship with Moret-sur-Loing, a former commune in Seine-et-Marne, last year. The Pengzhou government invited Moret-sur-Loing to participate in the third Tianfu Ancient Town Art Festival in Chengdu this year, and asked the town to send a troupe to perform at the festival. It also hopes Moret-sur-Loing will establish an ofice in Bailu to coordinate bilateral cooperation projects.

Moret-sur-Loing will also open a French restaurant and bakery in Bailu, according to the local government.

Pengzhou sent a delegation to New Zealand, Vanuatu and Australia in early May, during which city mayor Dong Li and Owen Gavika, mayor of Luganville in Vanuatu, signed a memorandum of friendly cooperation.

The memorandum makes Luganville the first city in a South Pacific Island nation to establish a friendly cooperation relationship with a city in Sichuan.

Pengzhou's government has been active in its search for domestic and foreign investors and trade partners through a number of influential trade and investment fairs and exhibitions in China.

In recent years, Pengzhou has attracted 23 large-scale projects in a range of sectors, with investors agreeing to spend about 6.41 billion yuan ($1.05 billion) on those projects.

The city has also attracted technical and business talents to engage in research and development work and set up new ventures there.

Wang Tao is one such talent who is realizing his dream in Pengzhou. With a doctorate in chemical and biological engineering from the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom, Wang is now president of three healthcare technology companies in Pengzhou.

Wang was born in the city and has a deep emotional bond with his hometown.

He returned through a government talent-hunting program, called Jinpeng Yingcai, or talents in golden Pengzhou, after gaining his doctorate.

"Pengzhou can make good use of Chengdu's technology and talent resources. I can find the right people for my businesses at Chengdu's key universities," Wang said.

With the government's help, Wang's companies are negotiating with major local hospitals, telecommunications companies and banks to cooperate on big data mining projects and applications in public health.

Last year, Pengzhou attracted a number of senior-level professional talents, including Wang, and launched a venture capital fund totaling 500 million yuan to support innovation and growth of new businesses.

A potted history of Pengzhou

Pengzhou is 25 kilometers to the northwest of downtown Chengdu, capital of Sichuan province. It covers an area of 1,421 square kilometers, and has a population of 810,000.

It is the core zone of Chengdu-Deyang-Mianyang economic zone, and is also an important part of the Longmen Mountain ecology tourism belt.

The city is a national vegetable planting base and is rich in herbal medicine resources. As a cradle of the ancient Shu Kingdom, which appeared in what is now Sichuan about 3,000 years ago, Pengzhou has a long history.

Pengzhou's annual GDP grew at 16 percent each year over the past five years. Its GDP hit 33.36 billion yuan ($5.13 billion) in 2015, and the average GDP per capita was $6,122. Main industries are petrochemical, bio-pharmaceuticals, aircraft engines, home textiles and clothing.

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Pengzhou reaches a memorandum of friendly cooperation with Seine-et-Marne in France's Ile-de-France region. Seine-et-Marne will become Pengzhou's 11th foreign partner town in 2017. Photos Provided To China Daily

Left: Longxing Temple, built from 405-418 during the East Jin Dynasty and with more than 1,600 years of history, has an array of pagodas. The major pagoda stands at 81 meters, making it Asia's tallest diamond-throne pagoda with Buddhist relics. Right: Wang Tao (right), an overseas returnee to Pengzhou, with a staf member of his company.

Pengzhou is known as the "hometown of peony". The earliest written record detailing the planting of the flower was found in the city in Tang Dynasty (618-907).

(China Daily 06/01/2016 page11)