Hainan has become a "new hot spot" for global investment, the province's governor Feng Fei said Monday at a press conference in Beijing on policy and institutional progress for developing the Hainan free trade port.

China's only tropical island has been at the core of the country's strategic blueprint of further opening up since June 1, 2020, when China released a master plan for the Hainan free trade port to build it into a globally influential duty-free trading center by the middle of the century.

Total foreign investment into the island, in actual use, amounted to $5.27 billion over the past three consecutive years, or over half of the total inflow in the last three decades, Feng said, adding that the capital came from over 80 countries and regions. 

The island also registered some 763,000 new market entities over the past three years, Party Chief of Hainan Shen Xiaoming revealed. This was close to three times the number in 2019.

In terms of new drivers for economic growth, Hainan has shifted the driving force from relying mainly on investment, especially in real estate and fixed assets, to the combined force of consumption and investment, Shen said. 

He added that Hainan connects China with some of the most vibrant markets in the world, such as those in Southeast Asia, therefore it's fair to say the province is positioned at the intersection of China's dual circulation economy, a strategy that seeks to reinforce the domestic market while staying wide open to overseas ones.

What makes Hainan special?

Hainan enjoys the shortest foreign investment negative list. The free trade port's negative list has 27 items, down from the 33 and 30 items of the 2020 versions of the national and pilot free trade zone foreign investment access negative lists. 

Negative lists define industries in which foreign companies cannot invest and specify restrictions or bans on certain types of foreign investment in China. 

Hainan has the lowest corporate tax rate. Enterprises in Hainan enjoy a tax rate of 15 percent, compared to 25 percent in other regions in China.

"These two policies are unique in the country," Feng said.

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(Cover: A view of Sanya Bay, Sanya City, Hainan Province, China. /CFP)

(Dai Kaiyi also contributed to the story)