This is a news report from chinadaily.com.cn: Significant progress has been 
made in Binzhou city, East China's Shandong province, over the past decade in 
achieving well-rounded high-quality development, local officials said.

Between 2012 and 2021, the city's gross domestic product increased by 95.5 
percent, with an average annual growth of 6.9 percent, according to Song 
Yongxiang, Party secretary of Binzhou.

The general public budget revenue grew at an average annual rate of 7.5 percent 
in previous years, reaching 28.73 billion yuan ($3.96 billion) in 2021, which 
provided strong financial support for the city's high-quality development.

Additionally, the industrial economy witnessed robust development in Binzhou. 
The city has developed five industrial clusters worth 100 billion yuan each and 
is home to 1,530 enterprises above designated scale, including five in China's 
top 500 list.

More focus has been placed in promoting sci-tech innovation in the last 10 
years of development. The R&D investment of Binzhou accounted for 3.36 percent 
of its GDP, ranking first in the province.

In the aluminum industry, one of the city's pillar sectors, the proportion of 
middle and high-end aluminum products increased by 30.2 percentage points in 
three years and reached 65.2 percent last year. The city has been named the 
national high-tech industrialization base for high-end aluminum.

Located in the lower reaches of the Yellow River, China's second longest river, 
Binzhou has also taken up the mission of boosting the ecological conservation 
and high-quality development of the Yellow River Basin.

According to Li Chuntian, mayor of Binzhou, the city has given top priority to 
ecological protection along the Yellow River.

By the end of 2021, the forest coverage rate in Binzhou had reached 31.8 
percent and the protection area of wetlands had reached 176,000 hectares, 
ranking fourth in the province. A 7.8 square-kilometer botanical garden along 
the Yellow River is currently under construction in an effort to create a 
better ecosystem.

Binzhou is working to develop ecological and efficient modern agriculture along 
the Yellow River to help improve living conditions for locals. To date, five 
modern agricultural industrial parks at or above provincial level have been 
built among counties and districts along the river. 

Comprehensive progress also has been made in employment, education, medical 
care and elderly care, said Song, adding that Binzhou is developing into a city 
suitable for living, working, traveling, and healthcare.

SOURCE: chinadaily.com.cn