Shanghai Confident of Achieving 5% Growth Target for Year: Vice Mayor

Shanghai officials on Monday pledged further opening-up measures, saying the city will better leverage high-level international cooperation and exchange platforms to promote high-quality development.

"The city's economy has demonstrated considerable resilience and vitality, and we are confident of achieving the expected growth target of around 5 percent for both the first quarter and the whole year," Vice Mayor Wu Wei told a press conference.

"Despite geopolitical uncertainties, Shanghai benefits from the strong momentum of leading enterprises, the unique strengths of reform and opening-up, strong science and technology talent, and the benefits of modernized governance."

Openness is Shanghai's greatest strength, and it has been focusing on key areas to expand high-level opening-up, and create a world-class business environment, thereby providing a stable and predictable development environment to support global enterprises in growing and expanding their operations here, officials noted.

Five years since its establishment, the Shanghai Hongqiao International Central Business District (CBD) has emerged as one of China's most dynamic trade and innovation engines.

Over the past five years, the Hongqiao CBD's import-export volume has increased to 102.72 billion yuan (US$14.92 billion) in 2025 from 56.8 billion yuan in 2021.

It has played a crucial role in improving transportation links, offering international services, and connecting domestic markets with those abroad.

Kong Fu'an, executive deputy director of the CBD's administrative committee, believes that with the pick-up in Chinese companies' going global initiatives, the district's significance and attractiveness will grow further and more companies in the Yangtze River Delta region will turn to Hongqiao as the first stop when going global.

KPMG China unveiled its new comprehensive hub KAMPUS in March 2024 to fully leverage its geographical and industry advantages to better connect with other parts of the country and better serve global customers and industries.

It has been working in tandem with the management committee of the CBD and has used global resource advantages and brand influence to attract enterprises to locate their businesses in the area, while also assisting local enterprises to connect with the capital market and step up globalization efforts, according to Frank Huang, regional head of markets, eastern and western region at KMPG China.

The optimism is shared by a number of leading multinationals that have built strong businesses in the city.

Shanghai is home to nearly 80,000 foreign-invested enterprises, which are a vital driving force for economic and social development.

Many of these companies have been based here for two or three decades, expanding their operations from trade to manufacturing and then to research and development, and have gradually grown into headquarters for China and even the Asia-Pacific region.

Global skincare company Beiersdorf AG has allocated US$81 million in investment this year for marketing, promotional activities, smart manufacturing facilities and local supply chain.

Last month, its wholly owned subsidiary NIVEA (Shanghai) Co Ltd was recognized by the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Commerce as a multinational's regional headquarters.

It has already established a distribution center, an innovation center, and a manufacturing center in suburban Qingpu District.

British healthcare firm Haleon last month announced a 65-million-pound (US$86.6 million) investment in a new oral health manufacturing site in the Lingang Special Area.

Gijs Sanders, head of dtrategy, marketing and figitalization of Haleon China, said the unique element about Shanghai is the very strong government support that really encourages partnerships.

"The city has a strong established ecosystem of innovative companies, R&D players and tech companies, even companies that are not originally from Shanghai have a strong presence here as well," he said.

"That creates a very good ecosystem for us to collaborate, especially as a healthcare company, as we need to have very well-established partners with cutting-edge innovation and science."

Shanghai also has strong attraction for domestic as well as foreign talent, and here many foreign and local companies work together to drive innovation and digitalization, Sanders noted.

Nat Madarang, president of Goodyear Asia Pacific, said the tire company continues to expand further and deeper into lower tier cities and is also looking to develop new retail formats, especially through e-commerce channels.

It recently launched a consumer experience center in Xuhui District.

"Shanghai's business environment continues to be very positive for us, with a good connectivity and a very supportive business environment fostered by the government, thanks to a lot of engagement at the city and district level," he observed.

Robert Mitrofan, chief representative of the Romanian Chamber of Commerce and Industry in China, said it was a natural choice to locate their representative office in Shanghai

"Shanghai is the economic capital of China, with many important events happening here, and it's a very special area for us and for the collaborators that we are trying to help businesses in Romania," he explained.

Romania is now focusing more on rebuilding its industrial capabilities and China is a very important collaborator in many endeavors in this sector, Mitrofan added.