“Annual salary of at least 260,000 yuan (US$36,666), plus 165 paid days off a year,” reads an online advertisement posted by the Longhua District Education Bureau last week, which is recruiting 400 teachers from university students who will graduate next year.
The ad went viral because of the high salaries it offers, the number of teachers it is recruiting at a time and the lower-than-usual thresholds it requires: Graduates with at least a bachelor’s degree are eligible to apply without the usual requirement of a teacher’s qualification or a diploma from a normal university.
Another seemingly unrelated piece of news broke out almost simultaneously: On Thursday morning, Shenzhen Hanwei Biotech Co. Ltd. registered with the city’s market supervision bureau in a process that took only dozens of seconds. Registration used to take at least one day. The new business registration system automatically verifies the application materials submitted online and approves a registration application immediately without human intervention.
These two pieces of news indicated action is in full swing in Shenzhen, although the city is still figuring out how to accomplish the goals set by central authorities to become a national model city and global benchmark.
City leaders convened an important meeting last Tuesday, where they laid out major tasks and discussed an action plan for the city to make endeavors toward becoming “a pilot demonstration area for socialism with Chinese characteristics,” one month after it was tasked with the new mission.
Although the action plan for 2019-2025 is still under discussion and has not been released to the public, city leaders spelt out major goals for the next several years at the meeting, which include taking the lead in achieving high-quality economic growth, democracy and the rule of law, cultural booms, shared prosperity, social satisfaction, and harmony between man and nature.
A report delivered at the meeting by Shenzhen Party chief Wang Weizhong revealed some plans that are of great interest to local residents and expatriates.
In addressing a major public concern, the report says the city will build more schools, adding 210,000 school seats by 2022, including 60,000 public senior high school seats. Compared with the number of school seats available currently, this is an ambitious plan. This year has seen nearly 80,000 middle school graduates compete for 35,531 seats at public senior high schools. Longhua District’s plan to recruit 400 primary and middle school teachers shows the city and district governments are acting swiftly to ease the shortage of school seats.
The report also reveals that the city will seek to expand the Qianhai Cooperation Zone and Qianhai-Shekou free trade area. A Bay Area Connect project will enable people in Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macao to enjoy convenience taking public transport, paying telecom charges and making electronic payments when they travel across the border.
A world city needs a truly international airport. Shenzhen will launch more international flights, aiming to have a total of 80 international routes by 2022 and 100 routes by 2025, according to the report.
The report also promises to adopt the rule of law to regulate government and market, and create a world-class, stable and predictable business environment featuring the rule of law. The new, hassle-free business registration system is an indication that the city is taking advantage of technologies to make it even easier to do business and launch startups. The overseas returnee who registered Shenzhen Hanwei Biotech Co. Ltd., the first one to use the new system, told a TV broadcaster that the system uses facial recognition technology to verify the applicant, making it possible to register a company within dozens of seconds while it would take one to two days in the U.S. to register a company.
The speed things are getting done will enable Shenzhen to catch up with top world cities very quickly. Empowered by a system with Chinese characteristics, the city has the execution ability and financial power to achieve its goals while many major cities in the West are mired in endless tussles between the executive branch and legislative branch, as well as other political scuffles, and undermined by a lack of consensus and well-conceived goals.
Nevertheless, Shenzhen is aware that technological advancement and economic prosperity alone will not be enough for it to serve as a model for other Chinese cities. The goals unveiled last week include creating a democratic rule-of-law environment, aiming to increase public participation in politics in an orderly manner. A full range of objectives were also listed to improve the quality of life in aspects including housing, elderly care, medical service and care for the disadvantaged.
Shenzhen’s pragmatism and efficient actions have contributed to its success over the past four decades. In the early days of Shenzhen Special Economic Zone, giant billboards with slogans “Empty talks endanger the nation, while practical work brings prosperity” and “Time is money, efficiency is life” were erected in Shekou. These catchphrases inspired the special zone builders who came to the wilderness of an unknown territory to chase their dreams.
While Shenzhen is now setting its sights on the next big things, those tenets remain relevant. Yet, complacency is the enemy. A resolution adopted at last week’s meeting urged the city not to be burdened by its past laurels, shackled by old experiences or deterred by difficulties.
(The author is head of the Shenzhen Daily News Desk.)