How did Tongxiang, Zhejiang, "create something out of nothing"?
Many people only know about the famous tourist destination, Wuzhen, but are unaware of Tongxiang City, the "powerful yet less - known mother" of Wuzhen.
If you look at the development data of Tongxiang over different time units, you'll see:
Within one second, the digital brain of Tongkun can generate approximately 1.5 million OT data.
In as fast as 9 minutes, the production line of Tairui Machinery can roll out an injection - molding equipment.
In just 364 days, a super factory can be built from scratch on the wasteland beside the roads in Tongxiang.
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However, after getting to know it, you'll find that the people of Tongxiang are truly masters at "creating something out of nothing"!
01 The Phenomenal "Creation out of Nothing"
The media has reported on the Zhonghong New Materials Project of Xin Fengming Group in Tongxiang.
Starting from the first pile driven on February 18, 2024, this project was built as a globally leading intelligent benchmark chemical plant. By February 15, 2025, when the first roll of polyester filament was produced, exactly 364 days had passed.
Inside the Xin Fengming Super Factory
The people of Tongxiang seem to be particularly good at "creating something out of nothing".
For example, although there is an ancient and quaint cultural town, it has broken the boundaries and become the permanent venue of the World Internet Conference;
The exterior view of the exhibition venue of the "Internet Light" Expo at the 2021 World Internet Conference Wuzhen Summit
Although located in the Hangjiahu Plain where no coconut trees grow locally, Tongxiang has ranked first in the sales of thick coconut milk in the country for many consecutive years, and coconut - based full - industrial - chain enterprises are everywhere;
FinO, a thick coconut milk brand in Tongxiang
Similarly, Tongxiang is not a major sheep - raising area, but it has become the largest woolen sweater distribution center in the country. The woolen sweater wholesale business in Puyuan accounts for 70% of the national market share. From January to November 2024, the total industrial output value of above - designated - size enterprises in Tongxiang exceeded 225.862 billion yuan, achieving a leap from the "Famous Town of Chinese Woolen Sweaters" to the "World Capital of Woolen Sweaters".
Why does Tongxiang seem to be especially good at "creating something out of nothing"?
02 The Ever - Standing Tongxiang and the Flux of Tongxiang Merchants
No matter how amazing a phenomenon is, there must be an internal development logic behind it.
Tongxiang is a county - level city under the jurisdiction of Zhejiang Province, administered by Jiaxing City. It is located in the golden triangle of Shanghai, Hangzhou, and Suzhou.
It covers an area of 727 square kilometers and has a registered population of 721,600.
However, its GDP is as high as 134.711 billion yuan. In the western region, it is comparable to a proper prefecture - level city.
The geographical location of Tongxiang
The people of Tongxiang seem to be born with a talent for business.
If we want to dig deep into the business genes of the people in Tongxiang, we have to trace back to the Spring and Autumn Period.
At that time, Tongxiang was at the border between the states of Wu and Yue. The needs of caravans coming and going and the daily life of the people gave rise to the germination of business activities in Tongxiang.
During the Tang and Song Dynasties, with the excavation and improvement of the Grand Canal, Tongxiang was able to develop its business better thanks to its natural water - transportation advantages. Silk and tea were the "hot commodities" that Tongxiang exported to various places at that time.
During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the handicraft industry and business in Tongxiang further developed and expanded. Puyuan Town became a famous silk - trading center, and Shimen Town became an important grain - distribution center.
Today, in Tongxiang, if you randomly throw a stone from the sky, it's very likely to hit a boss.
Tongxiang has a permanent population of just over one million. Among these one million people, there are 200,000 business entities.
In other words, one out of every five people in Tongxiang is a boss.
Therefore, it's easy to imagine how prosperous Tongxiang is.
Tongxiang has 8 towns and 176 villages. According to relevant data, in 2024, the income of rural economies in Tongxiang exceeded 1.4 billion yuan.
Put it this way, without considering the income from their own businesses, just the money distributed by the villages, each village can get 8 million yuan. That's why Tongxiang has become the first county in the country to achieve common prosperity.
"Merchants from all directions gather here, and there are thousands of households with prosperous lives."
03 Thirty - Year Industrial Accumulation to Break through the Resource Dilemma
Tongxiang has never given up on the path of the real economy.
If the Grand Canal once illuminated Tongxiang's trading skills, then the new - materials industrial cluster independently built by Tongxiang today is a creation from scratch, opening up a broader future for Tongxiang.
Now, one out of every three wind - power blades in the world comes from Tongxiang.
Different from the representative "Puppy Economy" in Zhejiang Province, this small southern town, which originally had no mineral resources, has transformed itself into a top - notch industrial city in China, giving birth to world - class new - materials enterprises such as Jushi, Xin Fengming, and Tongkun.
Everyone knows that new materials are both strategic and fundamental industries, which can be regarded as the cornerstone of China's manufacturing industry. But how did Tongxiang, which has no mineral resources at all, develop and expand its new - materials industry?
This is a good question. You know, new materials are still materials. And Tongxiang, with its woolen sweater industry worth hundreds of billions, has long formed natural advantages in raw materials and cost within the industrial cluster.
An industrial robot at work
The woolen sweater industrial chain in Puyuan has created unique conditions for the development of Tongxiang's new - materials industry.
According to the 2023 industrial report of the Economic and Information Technology Bureau of Tongxiang City, there are currently 2,178 textile and clothing enterprises in Puyuan. In 2023, the output of high - end functional fabrics reached 126,000 tons, and about 31% of them were used in the field of new - materials composite substrates.
It only takes 15 minutes to drive from Puyuan to the downtown area of Tongxiang. The response efficiency of the supply chain is much higher than that in other areas of the Yangtze River Delta. Therefore, settling in Tongxiang is the best choice for new - materials enterprises.
Moreover, the people of Tongxiang have long been aware of the future dividends of the new - materials industry and have laid the foundation for developing the new - materials industrial cluster early on.
In 1993, Zhang Yuqiang, a businessman from Tongxiang, led the establishment of Tongxiang Jushi Glass Fiber Co., Ltd., the predecessor of today's glass - fiber giant, Jushi Group, officially kicking off the development of Tongxiang's new - materials industry.
The first project of Jushi Glass Fiber was located 3 kilometers southwest of Tongxiang. Starting from a small enterprise covering only 80 mu of land, it took 15 years for Jushi Group to break the 70 - year - long pattern where the United States dominated the world's glass - fiber industry with an annual production capacity of over 600,000 tons.
The overseas factory of Jushi Glass Fiber
As Jushi Group took the throne as the world's number - one in the glass - fiber industry, Tongxiang, the birthplace of Jushi, has been accelerating towards the goal of building a globally competitive new - materials industrial cluster.
Attracted by Jushi, more and more new - materials enterprises have settled in Tongxiang. Zhenshi, Tairui, Xin Fengming... As the "circle of friends" of Tongxiang's new - materials industry expands, Tongxiang has blazed a new trail from producing glass fibers to using them, gradually forming a complete industrial chain from production to processing and then to composite - material manufacturing, which has attracted the China International Wind - Power Composite Materials Summit to be held in Tongxiang three times.
More than 30 years ago, perhaps no one would associate the term "powerful industrial city" with Tongxiang. But now, whether it's the demand for wind - power products under the trend of low - carbon development or the use of new materials in new - energy vehicles, which one can avoid mentioning Tongxiang's enterprises?
Just like how it became the "Number - One City of Chinese Woolen Sweaters" despite its underdeveloped livestock industry, at the time of the transformation from "Made in China" to "Intelligently Made in China", Tongxiang has once again solved the resource problem and moved forward towards the "new", achieving a breakthrough from nothing to something.
The "Wuzhen Light" Supercomputing Center
04 The "Most Powerful Brain" to Face Digital Innovation
Actually, in the eyes of the Chinese, fortune is a very important thing. As the ancients said, "When the time comes, heaven and earth will work together." When an individual's fate meets the trend of the times, it can often lead to a situation where a single spark can start a prairie fire.
Tongxiang has turned its meager luck into a "winning hand" by firmly seizing powerful opportunities.
In 2014, the first World Internet Conference was held in Wuzhen, Tongxiang. The real - life version of "The Truman Show" brought great opportunities to Wuzhen and presented Tongxiang with the necessary conditions for industrial transformation from "manufacturing" to "intelligent manufacturing".
After the Internet Conference, Tongxiang quickly established the strategy of "Digital Tongxiang", attracting high - tech enterprises such as Alibaba and Hikvision to settle down, accelerating the formation of emerging industrial clusters such as artificial intelligence and the Internet of Things, and laying the groundwork for leading and embracing the digital wave.
By the time the World Internet Conference was permanently located in Tongxiang in 2021, Tongxiang had built the "Most Powerful Brain" in Zhejiang Province - the "Wuzhen Light" Supercomputing Center, making computing power a new resource "grown" on the land of Tongxiang.
Who would have thought that while others were still struggling in the same - industry competition, Tongxiang had already opened up a new track to face new opportunities.
Centering around the "Wuzhen Light" Supercomputing Center and the China Unicom Intelligent Computing Center, Tongxiang has established a hybrid computing - power system of "supercomputing + intelligent computing", accelerating the digital transformation of traditional industries, with the new - materials industrial cluster being the first in line.
Thus, in the spotlight of the industry, "future factories" began to rise from the wasteland in Tongxiang.
In 2019, Xin Fengming was the first to introduce the concept of 5G, bringing 8K high - definition cameras and 5G quality - inspection robots into the filament production workshop, promoting the 5G information - technology transformation of traditional factories;
In 2020, Tongkun's project of an intelligent super - simulated fiber with an annual output of 500,000 tons was officially put into production, and the first super factory in Zhouquan appeared;
In 2022, the intelligent manufacturing base of Jushi was fully established, becoming the "lighthouse" leading the world's glass - fiber industry;
In 2023, Zhenshi's industrial park with the largest global consumption of glass fibers and the most varieties of composite new materials was built at the southern end of the Tongxiang Development Zone;
In 2024, the integrated intelligent - construction base of Tairui Machine was officially unveiled. Also in this year, the Zhonghong New Materials Project of Xin Fengming Group passed the application...