Industrial Cluster: How Does Xinjiang'S 200 Billion Yuan Cotton And Textile And Clothing Industry Grow

"In the past ten years, Xinjiang has attracted more than 1350 textile and clothing enterprises from other provinces, regions and cities to invest in Xinjiang, and the total number of textile and clothing enterprises has increased by about 5.7 times, becoming a new highland for the agglomeration and development of China's textile and clothing industry." The recent 2023 Xinjiang Cotton Industry Development Forum and Xinjiang Cotton Production and Marketing Matchmaking Conference revealed this exciting news.

As a typical industry with strong ability to absorb employment among the "eight major industrial clusters", the development of Xinjiang's cotton and textile and clothing industrial clusters will certainly open a new journey and step up to a new level, driven by multiple favorable conditions such as the construction of the pilot free trade zone, opening up to the west, and counterpart assistance to Xinjiang.

Give play to the advantages of raw materials to attract industrial clusters

By the end of October, there were 3725 textile and clothing enterprises in Xinjiang.

The rapid development of Xinjiang's textile and clothing industry is inseparable from Xinjiang's unique advantages in raw materials. "As an important major cotton producing area in China, in recent years, Xinjiang's cotton production layout has been continuously optimized, and cotton quality has steadily increased," said Liang Yong, Deputy Secretary General of the People's Government of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region.

This year, 25 major cotton planting counties (cities) in Xinjiang accounted for 90% of the cotton planting area of the whole Xinjiang, and the cotton planting farms of Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps were reduced from 103 to 78, so that cotton production was further concentrated in advantageous cotton regions.

Although the cotton planting area in Xinjiang has been reduced, the cotton yield has remained stable and the quality has continued to rise. In 2022, Xinjiang cotton has many indicators that can be compared with the world recognized American cotton and Australian cotton. It can be said that the comprehensive quality of cotton in Xinjiang is at the best level since the target price reform, and the cotton quality ranks among the top in the world.

In terms of raw material supply, Xinjiang's pure cotton yarn output has accounted for one third of the country's total, and polyester fiber manufacturing has also achieved a historic breakthrough. The 300000 ton polyester chemical fiber project in Aral City of the First Division of Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps was completed and put into operation, realizing the breakthrough of zero polyester fiber manufacturing in Xinjiang; The 250000 ton polyester staple fiber project of Zhongtai will also be put into production at the end of this year.

"This marks that Xinjiang textile raw materials have achieved the tripartite confrontation of cotton, viscose fiber and polyester fiber, laying the foundation for the coupling development of Xinjiang cotton and oil resources, and creating conditions for Xinjiang to accelerate the construction of textile and clothing industry cluster highlands and export processing bases." Liang Yong said.

High quality raw materials attracted the rapid growth of fixed asset investment in the textile and clothing industry. According to the data, from 2014 to 2022, the fixed asset investment in Xinjiang's textile and clothing industry totaled 285.9 billion yuan, with an average annual growth rate of 20% year on year, ranking first in the growth rate of fixed asset investment in all major industries in Xinjiang.

"While the number of enterprises and fixed asset investment are growing, the cotton textile industry chain is accelerating its extension," Liang Yong said. In 2022, Xinjiang's yarn, cloth and clothing production capacity will be 5.11 times, 13 times and 4.66 times higher than that in 2014 respectively, and the chemical fiber will increase by 50.8% compared with that in 2014.

In the first nine months of this year, Xinjiang's yarn output was 1.726 million tons, up 14.8% year on year, its cloth output was 926 million meters, up 41.2% year on year, and its chemical fiber output was 619000 tons, up 18.8% year on year.

Overall, in 2022, the output value of the whole cotton, textile and clothing industry chain in Xinjiang will exceed 200 billion yuan, and the local conversion rate of cotton will be 33%. It is estimated that more than 2.2 million spindles will be added in 2023, and more than 20000 looms will be added.

Strengthen policy support and improve public services

In recent years, Xinjiang has introduced many preferential policies, which almost cover all links of the cotton and textile and clothing industry chain. In addition to freight subsidies, preferential electricity prices, one-time new jobs, pre job training and talent introduction, technology upgrading subsidies, etc., have played an important role in helping the industry chain to attract investment.

Since this year, the autonomous region has introduced a series of cotton industry related policies:

——Publish the Implementation Plan of 2023-2025 Cotton Target Price Policy, and timely cash the 2022 cotton target price subsidy.

——The Implementation Plan of Target Price Subsidy Policy and Quality of Cotton in the Autonomous Region in 2023 was issued to improve the quality subsidy policy.

——The Implementation Plan on Printing and Distributing the Pilot Program for Military Local Cotton Market Integration in 2023 was issued to promote military local cotton market integration.

——The Pilot Plan for Cotton Income Insurance was formulated to provide cotton farmers with a new market-based income insurance mechanism with stable basic income.

——We launched the policy of extending the chain, supplementing the chain and strengthening the chain, increased the subsidies for the transportation of clothing and other end products out of Xinjiang, and subsidized the fixed asset investment loans for enterprises to expand their production scale. From 2023, the freight subsidy for clothing, home textile, knitting, industrial textiles and other end products will increase from 4% of the original product sales to 6%.

At the same time, Xinjiang is further improving the public service system of cotton textile industry. The Xinjiang Textile and Clothing Industry Development Plan (2018-2023) issued in 2018 established the layout of "three cities, seven parks and one center", of which "one center" is the Urumqi International Textile and Clothing Trade Center, which is positioned to build a textile and clothing research and development center, design center, exhibition and sales center, and trade settlement center in the central and western regions of the country.

"Urumqi International Textile and Clothing Center is an important starting point to realize the layout of Xinjiang's textile and clothing industry and build Xinjiang's cotton and textile and clothing industry cluster, and is a key link in the layout of the autonomous region's textile and clothing industry." Liu Maolin, chairman of the Urumqi International Textile and Clothing Center Investment and Development Company, said that 13 industrial projects of the center, the park service center The R&D and design center has been put into use; Sandship Outlets, Tongchuang Trade Port, hotels, intelligent storage and other projects will be opened in 2024; Industrial cultivation base, Lianggang Industrial Park and other projects are expected to be completed in 2025.

Urumqi International Textile and Clothing Center is located in the center of the functional block of Urumqi Economic Development Zone of China (Xinjiang) Pilot Free Trade Zone. It has the regional advantages of welcoming the international airport area in the north, relying on the China Europe Train Assembly Center in the south, connecting the comprehensive bonded area in the west, and connecting the high-speed railway area in the east.

Planting Chinese parasol trees attracted the phoenix. "We will provide nanny like landing services for enterprises, assist in the declaration of free trade pilot zone policies, and provide services such as smart parking, smart office space, cross-border trade, hotel accommodation and logistics," Liu Maolin said.

After visiting Urumqi International Textile and Clothing Center, Yang Xiong, chairman of Hubei Yinfeng Industrial Group Co., Ltd., said, "We have been engaged in cotton planting, purchasing, processing and trade in Xinjiang for 20 years. Xinjiang has many advantages, such as low electricity prices, high subsidies, close to Central Asia and European markets, and we are full of confidence in developing in Xinjiang."

Now, Urumqi International Textile and Clothing Center welcomes the Xinjiang headquarters of the National Cotton Trading Market Group to settle down; Operating e-commerce live broadcast base and supply chain selection center, the cumulative number of transaction orders is 600000, and the transaction volume is 25 million yuan; Jointly set up the "Xinhui Industrial Coordination Center" with Wuxi Huishan Economic Development Zone to promote the coordinated development of industries in the central and western regions. Urumqi International Textile and Garment Center Investment and Development Co., Ltd. has carried out block transactions around cotton textile transactions, with a total transaction volume of 4.4 billion yuan, and its business has expanded to North China, East China and South China.

Extending the industrial chain to complement the development weakness

While making achievements in development, Xinjiang's textile and garment industry still faces some shortcomings. For example, the variety and structure of Xinjiang cotton textile products need to be optimized; The downstream clothing, knitting, home textile and other end industries have made slow progress, with small scale and low local deep processing rate; Low operating rate of printing and dyeing industry; The fluctuation of cotton transaction price has a great impact on the cost.

In response to these problems, Liang Yong said that Xinjiang has defined the goal of the development of the textile and clothing industry in the next stage: by 2028, the output value of the whole cotton and textile and clothing industry chain in Xinjiang will exceed 300 billion yuan, the local conversion rate of cotton will be 45%, the cloth output will be 2 billion meters, and the clothing and clothing output will be 800 million pieces (sets).

"Ten key tasks have been identified around this goal," Liang Yong said. These ten key tasks are respectively to build a high-quality cotton base, promote chain extension, build industrial clusters, expand domestic and international markets, strengthen technology empowerment, cultivate brands, build high-quality industrial workers, promote clean and safe production, build a public service system, and expand publicity.

The promotion of chain extension and supplement is to enhance the competitiveness of equipment technology. It is necessary to promote the integrated development of cotton industry and petrochemical industry, develop printing and dyeing with high standards, and increase terminal support such as clothing. "In view of the fact that Xinjiang's cotton textile products are mainly pure cotton yarn, pure viscose yarn and cotton/viscose blended yarn, and lack of cotton/polyester fiber and other differentiated fiber raw materials blended yarn dominated by the domestic market, we support domestic chemical fiber leading enterprises to build chemical fiber textile industry chain integration bases based on Xinjiang petrochemical resources, and develop more cotton/polyester/viscose blended products." Liang Yong said.

Enterprise is the foundation of industry. "In the future, it will still be an important task for the development of the textile and clothing industry to introduce strong enterprises and accelerate the construction of industrial clusters." Liang Yong said that Xinjiang will focus on the southern Xinjiang region and take the construction of the Aksu Alar National High tech Industrial Development Zone as an opportunity to actively undertake the group, chain and cluster transfer of the textile and clothing industry in the central and eastern regions.

"The market is the traction of industrial development, which will give full play to Xinjiang's geographical and transportation advantages near the Central Asian and European markets to help enterprises expand the market." Liang Yong said. Specifically, it is to promote the integration of domestic and foreign trade in the cotton textile industry, hold a series of Xinjiang cotton promotion activities, and help enterprises to vigorously expand the international market through exhibitions such as Canton Fair and Import Expo and multilateral cooperation mechanisms such as RCEP.

The public service system is the catalyst for industrial development. At present, Xinjiang is accelerating the construction of a national cotton and cotton yarn trading center and an Urumqi international textile and clothing trade center, and encouraging domestic industry institutions, large enterprises and other investment entities to participate in the construction of public service institutions and platforms such as technology research and development, inspection and testing, design consulting, education and training, and spot trading.