EDITOR'S Note:
Shanghai is throwing its economic weight behind a campaign to turn itself into a global financial, shipping and trade center.
The city welcomes global voices in this daunting process.
Each year, the most astute minds in the corporate and financial world are invited to Shanghai by the mayor to offer their advice on how the city can best move forward with sustainable and balanced growth.
The International Business Leaders' Advisory Council for the Mayor of Shanghai, now at its 23rd annual session, has become a mature and highly respected forum providing a convergence point between global experience and the city's aspirations.
Ahead of this year's think-tank meeting, Shanghai Daily and Oriental Morning Post sponsored a pre-forum survey, seeking to collect constructive opinion and advice from senior executives at multinational companies and overseas financial media professionals working and living in Shanghai.
Our input survey is supported by the Information Office of the Shanghai Municipality, the Foreign Affairs Office of the Shanghai Municipality and Shanghai Association of Enterprises with Foreign Investment.
We are honored to receive responses from people in major overseas companies and institutions in this year's survey and select part of them in a booklet, which will be presented to the International Business Leaders' Advisory Council for the Mayor of Shanghai when it meets.
Acknowledgement
We appreciate all the companies and organizations which have supported the survey, especially the following ones:
BNP Paribas (China) Ltd
Bosch (China) Investment Ltd
Chartis Insurance Company China Ltd
Citibank (China) Co Ltd
Groupe Danone
GM China Group
Henkel China
HSBC Bank (China) Co Ltd
Intel China Ltd
PricewaterhouseCoopers
Sankei Shimbun
Shell Companies in China
Shui On Group
Andrew Au
Chairman,Citibank(China) Co Ltd
Chief Executive Officer,Citi China
Based on your own experiences, what are Shanghai's advantages to help you operate your business in Shanghai?
Citigroup has a long association with Shanghai, dating back to 1902. Today, Shanghai is our China headquarters, and has been since 1993, reflecting our strong understanding of Shanghai's advantages and support for the city. From our perspective, Shanghai provides an excellent environment to support Citi's own growth plans for China. Among other factors, it has a sound and efficient financial sector, well established financial infrastructure, including the stock exchange and bond market, and offers a large talent pool of well trained candidates for employment. Moreover, the leadership of Shanghai has consistently demonstrated a clear vision for the future of the city, and we are seeing this vision being fulfilled as Shanghai continues to evolve into an international financial center. For these reasons, we have more than 2,500 employees in Shanghai, we have 11 consumer banking outlets here, and we base one of our major software centers and a processing center here that support our business worldwide.
What aspects should the Shanghai Municipal Government pay attention to in terms of improving business environment? What measures can be taken accordingly?
The Shanghai Municipal Government is already very active in continually improving the business environment in Shanghai. If we are talking in the context of Shanghai becoming an international financial center, the journey towards this goal is well and truly underway. Areas that will need to continue to be addressed include the convertibility of the renminbi, the pursuit of a competitive taxation regime, attracting the right talent and undertaking talent development, and the increased participation of international financial service providers in the city. Overall, we are happy with the environment Shanghai provides, and have great confidence in Shanghai's future prospects.
What kind of working and living environment does Shanghai need to attract talents in different industries?
Shanghai is already a very convenient and culturally welcoming city, and is becoming increasingly cosmopolitan in nature. Great strides have also been made in recent years in improving the infrastructure around the city and making it an easier place to live for its residents. In the future, we hope Shanghai continues to advance as a very stable, efficient, clean and open city. By doing so, it will attract the talent required to be a successful center across a range of sectors, and particularly the financial services sector. When we speak about talent, this means not only those working in the banking sector, but people who are able to work in an array of professional support services necessary to the viable functioning of any global financial center.
Do you have any other suggestions?
With large and dynamic institutions such as the Shanghai Stock Exchange and the Shanghai Futures Exchange, and a high number of financial institutions (both domestic and international) based here, Shanghai is already a financial center. Over time we are confident the international nature of Shanghai's financial services sector will grow and flourish. Shanghai has already laid down a comprehensive vision for the future, and we have every confidence that it will continue to achieve the key elements of this vision. We look forward to playing a role in contributing to Shanghai's success, through further building our presence here, through training and supporting an increasing number of employees, through widening our scope of business with companies and individuals doing business in Shanghai, and through lending our global experience and insights to help advance Shanghai's plans of becoming an international financial center.
Qin Peng
Chairman Groupe Danone, China
Based on your own experiences, what are Shanghai's advantages to help you operate your business in Shanghai?
In examining Shanghai's advantages that help business operation here, the traditional role as the business and manufacturing center of China and its reputation as China's most advanced city make it the ideal business hub of the nation, and possibly of the region. That's why Danone relocated the Asia Pacific headquarters in Shanghai in 2005.
In the course of Shanghai's restructuring to become a modern global trade center, especially in the course of Shanghai's development in the service sectors, Shanghai has demonstrated new advantages including:
Efficient infrastructure
Developed logistics industry
Relatively advanced financial services
Proximity to customers
Labor talent pool
What aspects should the Shanghai Municipal Government pay attention to in terms of improving business environment? What measures can be taken accordingly?
Shanghai has shown an impressive success story over the past decades and we believe in the city's capability to transform itself to a world-class business location. However, as some of its existing competitive advantages are eroding, Shanghai will have to create new ones to maintain its leading position and an improving business environment.
The following three areas are of special importance to us:
Sustainable development - with balanced focus on economic growth and social progress.
Culture of openness - that embraces new perspectives, welcomes innovations, demands for new ideas and stimulates new practices that meet emerging needs from businesses.
A fair marketplace - ensuring that the legal and regulatory frameworks are transparent and fair, and government and administrative processes are of highest integrity.
What kind of working and living environment does Shanghai need to attract talents in different industries?
While Shanghai's business environment is incredibly dynamic, there is still room to improve Shanghai's working and living conditions to attract both foreign and local talents.
Further improving the quality of life in Shanghai would include:
A healthier and cleaner environment
The quality and cost of attractive housing
Quality schools and language training/educational institutes (for expatriates and their children)
The quality of entertainment
Freer access to information (such as the world press and Internet)
Better protection of Shanghai's history heritage and traditional culture
Simpler immigration processes and broader criteria for longer-term visas or permanent residency for both foreign and local talents
Efforts to ease the language barrier as much as possible
Do you have any other suggestions?
At this year's IBLAC meeting, Mr Franck Riboud, CEO of Danone, is proposing a new model of homecare system that engages the support of the private sector and aims to enhance Shanghai's health care reforms by reducing pressure on hospitals, improving patient care and ensuring more efficient allocation of resources. Mr Riboud will also share with the leaders of Shanghai the experience of Danone's Nutricia in Europe that would be of relevance to Shanghai, demonstrating the cost-saving benefits of an efficient homecare system.