Coordinated momentum needed for area surrounding capital

BEIJING - Beijing and its neighbors will focus on coordinating economic development in 2015 in order to be a leading force for the national economy, according to a newly-released municipal work report.

The national capital, along with Tianjin Municipality and Hebei province, a region referred to as Jingjinji, were the target of a national initiative set forth by Chinese President Xi Jinping in February 2014.

Urging coordination and integration, the initiative seeks to balance development, the environment, population and resources, while building an economic zone surrounding Beijing.

More than 100 million people live in the Jingjinji zone, which has a combined area of 216,000 square km. Yet there is a big development gap between Beijing and Hebei. Heavily polluted Hebei still has several million people living in poverty and faces the heavy task of cutting excessive iron, steel, cement and glass capacity.

The three urgently need to coordinate to solve the air pollution problem.

The implementation of the strategy is on the top of the work agenda for the Beijing municipal government in 2015, according to a government work report delivered to the municipal legislature on Friday by Mayor Wang Anshun.

With a population of 21 million, the overcrowded capital is struggling to slow down population growth and deal with frequent bouts of choking smog.

Beijing will accelerate the transfer of non-essential functions, such as general manufacturing, downtown wholesale markets as well as some educational and medical services this year, according to the report.

The city will "lay out the annual task list for transportation infrastructure integration, ecological and environmental protection and industrial transfer, so as to make new progress as soon as possible," the report said.

Hebei will push for in-depth and substantial cooperation with Tianjin and Beijing this year, said the Hebei government earlier this month in its work report.

Apart from improving "bottleneck" highways, Hebei will better cooperation in air pollution control and seek to build industrial parks and innovation platforms this year.