Singapore companies encouraged to invest in China's Suzhou industrial park

Singapore's Minister of State for Trade and Industry Lee Yi Shyan on Friday encouraged local investors to seize opportunities of service outsourcing, logistics and water and environmental services in the Suzhou Industrial Park (SIP), the joint project between Singapore and China.

Speaking at the economic cooperation forum on China's city of Suzhou and Suzhou Industrial Park, Lee noted that as China is an increasingly popular destination for business process outsourcing (BPO) operations and has launched several initiatives to promote service outsourcing, the Suzhou industrial park, which has been designated as a BPO demonstration base, is a very attractive platform for Singapore companies to ride the BPO wave in China.

As an iconic collaboration project started in 1994 between the two countries, the park has contributed 3 percent to China's totalhi-tech industrial value, and has drawn 304 Singapore investment projects valued 1.97 billion U.S. dollars.

When Chinese Vice Premier Wu Yi visited Singapore this week, both countries have revised the 10-year targets to further steer the park towards a hi-tech and high value-added economy.

Referring to logistics, Lee said, "As a manufacturing stronghold in China, SIP requires reliable and experienced logistics players to support the demands of its manufacturers. Our third party logistics companies are well-equipped to meet those needs, having developed the requisite competencies through years of experience in serving multinational companies (MNCs)."

Given China's pressing needs and ambitious goals in environmental protection, the minister pointed out that Singapore's developmental experience and expertise in environmental engineering will come in useful in China's water and environmental services.

Singapore's water and environmental companies such as Sembcorp, Keppel and Hyflux are already actively pursuing projects in China. But there are still untapped areas in Suzhou and SIP that Singapore companies can look into, the minister said.

"For instance, we can look at a more integrated fashion on helping Chinese authorities to achieve their energy saving and emission reducing targets, by providing the necessary hardware and software solutions," he added.