GDP increased 3 percent year-on-year to 348.19 billion yuan ($53 billion) for Zhuhai in 2020 despite challenges from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Tertiary industry became a major economic developer with a GDP contribution rate of 69.74 percent, according to the Statistical Communiqué of Zhuhai on 2020 National Economic & Social Development. The report was released March 26 by the Statistics Bureau and local survey team of the National Bureau of Statistics.

The value-added amount of primary, secondary, and tertiary industries was 6 billion yuan ($914.4 million), 151.09 billion yuan ($23 billion), and 191.11 billion yuan ($29.1 billion) respectively with rises of 1.6 percent, 1.8 percent, and 4.1 percent.

Fixed-asset investment grew by 13.1 percent to 223.04 billion yuan ($34 billion) in 2020, whereas total retail sales of consumer goods dropped by 7.5 percent to 92.13 billion yuan ($14 billion) and foreign trade value decreased by 6.1 percent to 273.06 billion yuan ($41.6 billion).

City General Public Budget (GPB) revenue rose by 10.1 percent to 37.91 billion yuan ($5.8 billion), and GPB expenditure increased by 10 percent to 67.76 billion yuan ($10.3 billion). Notably, expenditures on nine livelihood items increased by 5.9 percent to 46.2 billion yuan ($7 billion), accounting for 68.2 percent of the total.

Excellent air quality [Photo courtesy WeChat account: zhuhaifabu]

Education accounted for 11.05 billion yuan ($1.7 billion) of the expenditure, with the number of schools and kindergartens having increased by 20 to 604 as of September 2020. The city had 966 medical institutions with 11,207 beds by late 2020 and health expenditure of 4.49 billion yuan ($684.3 million). 

With a strong input in science and technology, the city garnered four State Scientific & Technological and 14 Guangdong Sci-Tech awards last year. In total, 24,434 patents received authorization by the end of 2020, a year-on-year increase of 28.8 percent.

A colorful cultural life was ensured by seven art troupes, four public libraries, nine museums, three galleries, 43 cinemas, 24 cultural stations, and 318 village cultural centers across the city. Today there are 1,400 sqm (.35 acres) of public cultural facilities for every 10,000 people.

Per capita disposable income of Zhuhai residents was 55,936 yuan ($8,525), a rise of 6.6 percent, while per capita expenditure was 36,360 yuan ($5,541), a drop of 4.8 percent. The number of private vehicles reached 832,600 by the end of 2020, a rise of 8.6 percent.

Zhuhai was home to 28 domestically listed enterprises in late 2020, which totaled 649.82 billion yuan ($99 billion) in market value. Turnover in stocks, funds, and bonds at local securities institutions exceeded 2 trillion yuan ($304.8 billion), up 43.4 percent year-on-year.

In addition, the city recorded 224 days with excellent air quality and 118 days with fine air quality, accounting for 61.2 percent and 32.2 percent of the total. The number of days with hazy weather decreased from 12 in 2019 to eight in 2020.

Affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, Zhuhai received 131.5 million visitors and generated 18.76 billion yuan ($2.9 billion) in tourism revenue in 2020, respective decreases of 56.2 percent and 57.8 percent. Average hotel occupancy rate also plummeted by 27.49 percentage points to 34.78 percent.