Lou Yangsheng, the Shanxi provincial party secretary, and Chen Derong, the Baowu Steel Group party secretary and the chairman of the board of the company, had a meeting on August 21. The two attended the signing ceremony of a strategic cooperation framework agreement between Shanxi Province Government and China Baowu Steel Group afterwards. Lin Wu, the Shanxi provincial deputy party secretary and provincial governor, Hu Wangming, the deputy secretary of Baowu Group Party Committee and the general manager of the company, as well as Lian Yiming and Wang Yixin, both of whom are the officials in Shanxi provincial government, attended the agreement signing ceremony as well.

Lou extended his welcome to Chen and his companions, and expressed his appreciation to Baowu’s support to Shanxi province. The cooperation between Shanxi provincial government and China Baowu Group, which is based on the principle of mutual benefit and trust, is believed to be fruitful, Lou said. We will always keep in mind Xi’s instruction and our mission, he said. President Xi Jinping has imposed great expectations to TISCO’s development. And our cooperation is a substantial implementation to Xi’s instructions, a specific step of the country’s manufacturing power strategy, as well as a concrete action to practice the political integrity of upholding the leadership of General Secretary Xi, the CPC and the central government. It is necessary to improve the political position, promote strong alliance, and complete the mission and tasks entrusted by the General Secretary, and hand over excellent answers. Special steel and special material should be strategically developed. China Baowu Steel, as a leading player in the world steel industry, is expected to help TISCO to strengthen its influence in world stainless steel sector, to speed up the development of special stainless steel, to tackle bottlenecking technologies, to improve its comprehensive competition, and to keep its predominance in special steel field. Technological innovation and green development have always been stressed by TISCO, who has contributed significant efforts to the transformation of China from a world factory to a manufacturing power. It is hoped that Baowu will, together with Shanxi Province, deliver substantial support to TISCO to set up a national key laboratory, to inject more investment into scientific research and to inspire staff to innovate. TISCO should seize the opportunity to explore bigger market and to forge itself into the most competitive player in international stainless steel industry chain. The contract signing marks a new chapter in cooperation between Shanxi province and China Baowu. It is hoped that Baowu will be an engine to the development of Shanxi, give full play to its unique advantages in emerging industries and industries in the future, and jointly transform Shanxi province’s resource advantages, comparative advantages and late-development advantages into economic advantages, competitive advantages and first-mover advantages, so as to achieve win-win and common prosperity, said Lou.

Chen expressed his appreciation to the support granted by Shanxi Province Party Committee and provincial government in this event. He spoke highly of the achievement and good trend of Shanxi’s transformational development. He said, Shanxi has abundant resources, outstanding industrial advantages, and a strong trend of high-quality transformation and growth. China Baowu is full of confidence in its development in Shanxi. It will seize the great opportunity of transformational development of Shanxi, give full play to its advantages, take Shanxi as a key industrial layout area, strengthen industrial cooperation with the province, promote scientific and technological innovation, realize complementary advantages in talents, technology and management, and make positive contributions to promoting high-quality transformation and development in Shanxi.

Lin Wu and Chen Derong signed a strategic cooperation framework agreement after the meeting. In according with the agreement principle of "government guidance, market operation, complementary advantages, mutual benefit and win-win", both sides will fully combine Shanxi's advantages in resources, energy and industrial foundation with China Baowu's advantages in industry, capital, technology and management. The two will carry out in-depth cooperation in more fields and projects, such as stainless steel manufacturing and processing, coking coal resource development and utilization, carbon-based new material industry layout, regional coal and chemical industry chain, light metal material industry, new infrastructure and digital economy, circular economy industry, exploration of mine resources, advanced machinery manufacturing industry, and etc. They will explore and promote integration of industry and finance, integration of industry and education, and that of production and city, jointly promote scientific research and innovation, and jointly create a new chapter of cooperation between central and local governments.