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Author|Prof. Tang Mengsheng, Director of the Center for Pakistan Studies at Peking University
China-Pakistan Economic Corridor is a dream of Pakistan and a dream of China as well. It’s a mutual choice of both countries. The dream is now coming true, which is highly praised by Pakistan and revitalizes the spirit of its government and people trapped in the economic embarrassment to fight against the adversity.
The Corridor will "pave a new path for local economic progress and prosperity, and will change the destiny of the local people", thus it is hailed as an "epoch-making" cause, said Prime Minister of Pakistan Nawaz Sharif. The Corridor will become the greatest milestone in the history of friendship between China and Pakistan and bring about much benefit to a total population of 3 billion. The largest Urdu newspaper in Pakistan Jang editorialized with the title of "Great Improvement in Cooperation between Pakistan and China" that the decision of building the Corridor had far-reaching significance and would reproduce the splendor of the eighth wonder of the world - Karakoram Highway.
Tang Mengsheng, right,meets the Vice President of the Asia Pacific Daily Guan Bo in Beijing.
China is committed to speeding up the change of economic development mode, promoting the strategy of western development and realizing the dream for national rejuvenation, while Pakistan is engaged in revitalizing its economy and realizing the dream of being a " Asia Tiger". With the similar development strategies and national dreams, China and Pakistan decide to enhance their pragmatic cooperation and render the advantages in high-level political mutual trust into the achievements in economic cooperation, thus realizing the win-win results and bringing about tangible benefits to the two peoples.
The long-range plan of China-Pakistan Economic Corridor mentions the "discussion on building industrial parks along the Corridor". For now, it is high time to build in Pakistan industrial parks that adopt the Chinese model and conform to the national conditions of Pakistan, which has also been a dream of its government and people for years. If a number of industrial parks are built along the Corridor, revolutionary changes will probably take place in Pakistani economy, thus enriching a part of Pakistanis in the first place. It is a philanthropic act of China to give a helping hand to Pakistan and also the best way to repay Pakistan for its deep friendship with China. Let's take two examples: first, expanding the Kashgar Special Economic Zone into a Cross-border China-Pakistan Industrial Park; second, building a Gwadar Port Industrial Park. The success of Kashgar Special Economic Zone depends much on the stableness, development and support of Pakistan, and better results will undoubtedly be produced if the Zone is upgraded to a Cross-border Industrial Park co-run by both China and Pakistan. As one end of the Corridor, Gwadar Port is in urgent need of an industrial park to serve as the back support and provides a best site to build an industrial park specializing in export-oriented economy. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has declared to build Gwadar Port into a "free port", another name for "Special Economic Zone".
It is of great significance to help Pakistan build industrial parks. Among the neighboring countries and international communities of China, Pakistan is the friendliest country to us. In a sense, to help Pakistan - our "good friends, partners, neighbors and brothers" - is to help ourselves, which is not only beneficial for Pakistan to tide over difficulties and make progress, but also helpful for China to destroy the containment of western countries including the US. In the meantime, it is imaginable for China to settle its own competitive industries in the industrial parks of Pakistan through the bundled transfer in the development process, which for the part of China, is also a matter with more positives than negatives and far-reaching influence. It is apparently significant to build an industrial park with Shenzhen model in Gwadar located at the coast of Arabian Sea, which is equal to building a new-type trade channel at a place located at South Asia, neighboring West Asia and facing Arabia and Africa across the sea.
As has been published in the newspaper, currently, the government of Pakistan has proposed to build 27 industrial parks, including 7 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and 5 in Balochistan. Therefore, for the part of China, it is extremely urgent to discuss the construction of industrial parks along the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor. Only by doing preparatory work in advance can we probably avoid the "fighting for routes" similar to the present and exert no negative influence on the normal progress of corridor construction. The time is ripe for duly launching the construction of industrial parks in Pakistan. As regards building industrial parks under the model of industrial cooperation between China and Pakistan, no matter the government or the masses of Pakistan, they will all give support.
Introducing the experience of building the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone to Pakistan is also an embodiment of China’s benefiting and repaying our friends for their help with the successful experience in terms of reform and opening-up. Many officers and persons of insight of Pakistan hoped that China's experience on reform and opening-up could become the catalyst for the economic recovery of Pakistan. Therefore, China-Pakistan Cooperation Forum Mechanism can be established to organize Chinese officers and scholars to come to Pakistan and introduce the development experience of Shenzhen, and meanwhile invite the counterparts of Pakistan to visit China for investigation and learning and arrange Pakistani students to choose politics, economy and sciences as their majors designedly, cultivating talents for the construction of China-Pakistan Economic Corridor.
We can help Pakistan build industrial parks and encourage the competitive industries of China to settle in Pakistan as well. Take the iron and steel industry for example: In China, due to the serious surplus of steel production, many steel works are on the verge of bankruptcy; while in Pakistan, the iron and steel industry generally lags behind with such problems as aging equipment, insufficient output and short supply. In this case, transferring Chinese iron and steel enterprises to Pakistani industrial parks can not only help Pakistan out of difficulties, but also find ways of survival and development for iron and steel enterprises of China. In addition, many oil refining enterprises, for example, those in Shandong and Xinjiang of China, often have no enough crude oil for refining and thus can also be transferred to Pakistan. We can build the oil refining enterprise in Gwadar Port, purchasing the crude oil from Iran, supplying some refined oil products to Pakistan and storing some locally for the purpose of building a large-scale overseas base of China for oil storage. What's more, fishing and fish-processing enterprises can be established in Gwadar Port, supplying products to the Middle East and China. The department concerned, therefore, can arrange relevant Chinese departments, scholars as well as enterprises to carry out surveys in Pakistan.
If the industrial park can successfully be built in Gwadar Port, it will not only enhance the security defense, but more importantly, bring about advantages as follows: First, important infrastructural facilities such as the local ports, airports and so on can fully be utilized; while currently, the commercial value of Gwadar Port is far from being fully embodied. Second, the economic progress of Balochistan, a remote and underdeveloped province in Pakistan, will be boosted and the economic gap between different regions within the nation thus narrowed. Third, this area has vast land and low land price, which results in relatively low cost in development. Fourth, this area is closer to Iran and Persian Gulf, which will better highlight the international effect of industrial parks with Chinese models in the future.
Prof. Tang Mengsheng, Director of the Center for Pakistan Studies at Peking University
Helping Pakistan prepare and develop industrial parks is totally based on the consideration of the economic progress and social development of Pakistan, which is of great strategic significance to Pakistan, be it at present or in the future. If there are several industrial parks completed for economic development according to the national conditions of Pakistan, and they can gradually show their functions, roles and goals, then they will not only exert positive influence on Pakistan, but more likely set an example for the countries along "the Belt and Road" and the whole world.
Due to various reasons, the economic construction and social development of Pakistan do leave much to be desired and even disappoint civilians sometimes. In particular, since the US launched the war in Afghanistan, the surroundings and domestic situation of Pakistan have become even more complicated, especially the safety conditions that are deteriorating, which has alarmingly caused tremendous adverse impact on politics, economy and society of Pakistan. The immediate consequences resulting from such adverse impact are economic downturn, less foreign investment, striking livelihood issues and the like confronting Pakistan at present. Therefore, building several industrial parks at a place far away from the battlefield of Afghanistan is intended to provide a reliable safeguard for the development of economy and society in Pakistan to the greatest extent, so as to attract investment and talents. Another reason for selecting a site neighboring Arabian Sea is that it will bring about more convenience to further the international connection and better use the international resources, because the site is located at the intersection between South Asia and West Asia, facing Persian Gulf, Middle East and Africa across the sea and belonging to one of three hubs connecting Asia, Africa and Europe via land, waterway and air, and thus has long been deemed as one of vital traffic hubs and strategic areas in the world. Perhaps, the unique advantages in geographic position can best explain the enthusiastic attention received by the concept of building industrial parks in Pakistan worldwide.
In a general sense, if breakthroughs can be made in the industrial cooperation and industrial park development for the construction of China-Pakistan Economic Corridor with a number of industrial parks being cooperatively built and realizing a sound progress in the process of constantly overcoming difficulties, then they will undoubtedly provide a golden opportunity that is beneficial for China, Pakistan, China-Pakistan relations and other aspects. Specifically, the main benefits are as follows.
First, they are beneficial to the development of Pakistan. As mentioned above, Pakistan is now in hard times, and if these industrial parks can be established and advanced, they will bring about remarkable and all-round benefits to Pakistan. On one hand, in terms of economy, they will contribute to the progress of politics, society and comprehensive national strength of Pakistan in varying degrees; on the other hand, they will definitely improve the international image and enhance the international influence of Pakistan.
Second, they are beneficial to expanding the interest of China. Judging from the perspective of economy only, China can rely on these industrial parks of Pakistan and their advantages to consolidate the status of Chinese products in the international market, promote the strategy of "going global" and make progress in other sectors.
Third, they are beneficial to the construction of China-Pakistan Economic Corridor. The most difficult problem confronting the construction of the Corridor at present lies in merely regarding the Corridor as a geographical route and ignoring the comprehensiveness contained in the bilateral economic cooperation, which has resulted in the political games within Pakistan in terms of route design and hindered the progress of corridor construction. If we can enhance the industrial cooperation between China and Pakistan wherever possible and give a positive push to the construction of industrial parks, allowing different districts to benefit from the said construction and more people to have jobs in Pakistan for the sake of economic progress and livelihood improvement, the predicament of "Battle of Routes" is likely to be broken through; if we change the idea by adopting the methods of "connecting dots with lines", that is, building a number of industrial parks along the Corridor, it might be helpful for speeding up the construction of the Corridor.
Fourth, they are beneficial to the consolidation of China-Pakistan relations. The diplomatic relations between China and Pakistan have so far lasted 65 years, which speaks volumes for the friendly cooperation between the two nations. Over the past 65 years, China and Pakistan have upgraded their mutual trust and friendship to an unmatchable level. If there is any defect in China-Pakistan relations, it would be the bilateral economic and trade cooperation that lags behind, even behind the status and momentum of political cooperation between the two nations. While the economic and trade cooperation between China and Pakistan has been constantly enhanced and achieved many accomplishments over the past 65 years, comparing to the their political cooperation and its performance, the potential contained in the economic and trade cooperation and the requirement of the mutual friendship, however, there is still much room for the economic and trade cooperation to develop.
The comprehensive national strength of China has been greatly improved during the 30-year-long reform and opening-up, and China has carried out a great deal of useful exploration in terms of economic construction and social development. In addition to feeling happy over the success achieved by China, Pakistan also hopes to use China's successful experience and methods for reference, including the case of Shenzhen Special Economic Zone, and apply the same to the domestic development. In the future development course of China-Pakistan relations, if China can give more, better and more effective support to Pakistan in terms of development of economy and society, besides promoting their cooperative relationship in a variety of fields, the friendship between the two nations will be undoubtedly furthered. And the concept of Pakistan on industrial parks happens to provide an opportunity for China to give play to its role in this respect. Provided that the construction of industrial parks can be realized with the participation and assistance of China, it will enrich the connotation of the friendly partnership between China and Pakistan without fail and become a new link to the traditional friendship between them, thus providing a new opportunity and impetus for the development of the bilateral relations.
Fifth, they are beneficial to improving the international status of China. If the concept of Pakistan on industrial parks can become a reality with the help of China, those developing countries and regions will truly feel the strength and capability of China and experience China's sincerity and executive force in helping other countries grow. A true, vivid and obvious fact definitely excels an argument. It will play an unprecedentedly-positive role in promoting the development of the countries and regions along the Belt and Road and enhancing their belief and confidence in terms of seeking and deepening the cooperation with China. Therefore, it will not only further the cooperation between China and Pakistan, adding luster to their friendship, but also offer new ideas and inspiration to South-South cooperation as well as all the countries and regions in hope of establishing friendly cooperative relationship with China; and China will, in turn, also achieve great progress in its international prestige and influence.
