Yesterday, Lishui and Ningbo officially signed a strategic cooperation agreement to jointly build a municipal-level “development enclave”, marking the entry of Zhejiang Province’s first such enclave into a substantive advancement phase. This innovative initiative not only establishes a new cooperation model that elevates collaboration from county-level platforms to municipal-level systematic planning and integrated promotion but also serves as a crucial practical vehicle for Zhejiang to deepen the “Eight-Eight Strategy” and explore new pathways toward common prosperity.

As reported, the Ningbo-Lishui municipal-level “development enclave” is proposed to be located in the core area of Lishui’s “Three-River Estuary” Collaborative Development Zone—a key strategic node envisioned as the “City’s Eye” in Lishui’s downtown master plan of “One Axis, Three Cities”. Positioned as a new urban area and economic growth engine driving the integrated development of Lishui’s urban districts, the enclave will leverage Ningbo’s key industrial platforms for planning and construction. It will focus on emerging sectors such as high-end manufacturing, digital economy, and biomedicine, innovating a cross-regional cooperation model characterized by “R&D and incubation in Ningbo, production and transformation in Lishui”.

Through this platform, Lishui can accurately connect with talent, technology, and market resources in the Yangtze River Delta core region, accelerating industrial transformation and upgrading. Meanwhile, Ningbo will expand its industrial development space, realizing efficient complementarity between high-quality production capacity and mountainous resources, and forming a mutually empowering development pattern.

Notably, the enclave has secured a series of strong provincial policy supports. It is clarified that Ningbo will contribute no less than 50 million yuan, with all proceeds retained in Lishui for development and construction until 2030. Additionally, the initiative has effectively driven the signing of 270 million yuan in county-level enclave cooperation funds, injecting robust “source vitality” into Lishui’s industrial development and factor guarantee.

Furthermore, the foundation for county-level enclave cooperation across Lishui has been fully consolidated. All regions have completed spatial surveys, site selection demonstrations, and plan formulations. Among them, five counties (cities) – Songyang, Qingyuan, Longquan, Jinyun, and Yunhe – took the lead in Zhejiang to sign cooperation agreements, laying a solid foundation for the advancement of the municipal-level “development enclave”.

This year marks the 23rd anniversary of the launch of the Lishui-Ningbo Mountain-Sea Cooperation and the 3rd anniversary of the establishment of paired cooperation between Lishui (a key old revolutionary base city) and Ningbo. In recent years, focusing on the goal of building a pilot demonstration zone for common prosperity in old revolutionary base areas, the two cities have closely followed the main theme of mountain-sea cooperation, actively explored innovative practices, and further formed a sound pattern of win-win development and joint pursuit of prosperity.

Currently, all 9 counties (cities, districts) of Lishui, as well as Lishui Economic and Technological Development Zone, have achieved full coverage of paired cooperation with Ningbo’s districts, counties, and development zones under the frameworks of old revolutionary base area development and mountain-sea cooperation. Since 2018, the two cities have launched 162 new industrial cooperation projects, attracting over 20 billion yuan in actually utilized investment.

“This signing represents a strategic breakthrough for both parties to leverage the characteristics of the ‘mountains’ (Lishui) and the advantages of the ‘sea’ (Ningbo) in addressing regional development imbalance, serving as an upgraded platform for deepening mountain-sea cooperation,” stated a relevant person in charge of Lishui Municipal Development and Reform Commission. He added that in the next step, Lishui will join hands with Ningbo to establish an efficient coordination mechanism, focusing on key areas such as policy synergy, resource integration, and industrial cultivation. Efforts will be made to promote the “development enclave” as an important “bridgehead” for Lishui to undertake high-end elements and integrate into the Yangtze River Delta, contributing the “Lishui-Ningbo Mountain-Sea Experience” to Zhejiang’s mountainous areas in exploring high-quality development pathways.