Over S$3b worth of projects inked at Singapore-Zhejiang meeting

IE SINGAPORE said on Monday that 15 project agreements worth over S$3 billion were signed at the 10th Singapore-Zhejiang Economic and Trade Council (SZETC) meeting held in Singapore.

This marks the highest number of project signings at the SZETC meeting since its inception in 2003 to promote economic exchanges and cooperation between the two cities.

The 15 agreements and memoranda of understanding (MOUs) are related to education, environmental services, financial services, marine economy development and social management - areas of collaborations that are in line with Zhejiang's 12th Five Year Plan to transform its economy.

Two special collaboration projects in social management, urban management and modern services, which will be developed on a commercially-viable basis, were also signed at the meeting:

1) Singapore Cooperation Enterprise (SCE) and the Shaoxing government have agreed to embark on a township project in the Shaoxing Binhai New City.

2) Mapletree has inked a special collaboration agreement with the Ningbo city government to deepen partnership on several projects across different industries, ranging from integrated developments, industrial parks to e-commerce logistics.

According to Zhejiang Department of Commerce, in the first nine months of this year, Singapore's actual investments in Zhejiang reached S$419 million (US$350 million). As at October 2014, cumulative actual investments have amounted to S$4.96 billion (US$4.14 billion) with 1,063 projects. In the first nine months of this year, bilateral trade increased 8.4 per cent to hit S$4.54 billion (US$3.79 billion).

The 10th SZETC meeting was attended by Grace Fu, Minister, Prime Minister's Office, Second Minister for the Environment and Water Resources and Second Minister for Foreign Affairs, and Zhejiang Party Secretary Xia Baolong for the first time.