Hualing Free Industrial zone gained its recognition in three nominations of Investment Monitor Economic Zone Sustainable Recovery Strategies award (Economic Zone Sustainable Recovery Strategies Awards 2021). In one of the categories, Hualing was awarded the main prize. The winners were announced in the scope of Barcelona New Economy Week, a virtual ceremony in October.
Hualing Free Industrial Zone executive director Soso Nibladze will tell us more about the recognition of the Hualing group and its future plans.
In what categories was Hualing Free Industrial Zone gained success?
Hualing Free Industrial Zone was awarded in the main category of Aftercare Support. According to the jury, during the post-covid period, Hualing Free Industrial Zone (FIZ) offered companies a variety of financially stimulating, legal, analytic and consultation services. In addition, Hualing developed special programs to support production development of the companies operating in the area, as well as to optimize management and gain access to financial resources.
Hualing took second place in the category of Covid Relief Packages. The company has offered optimized mechanisms to its tenants and these mechanisms have eased the operations during the pandemic.
Hualing Group and Hualing FIZ sustainability and ESG (environmental, social, and corporate governance efficiency) has gained honourable recognition. The jury has noted that the company is focused on the sustainable development of the environment.
In Economic Zone Sustainable Recovery Strategies award the world’s largest economic zones were competing for side by side with Hualing FIZ. The main winner of this award was the Coyol Free Zone of Costa Rica, the second winner of the nomination was Łódź Special Economic Zone in Poland. Lithuania, Latvia, the United Arab Emirates, Great Britain, and the economic zones of other states were awarded in other subcategories.
It is noteworthy, that Hualing FIZ has gained such remarkable recognition after only 5 years of its operations, while other participants of the awards are distinguished with multi-year of operation experience. Another factor making our success remarkable is that currently there are more than three thousand free economic zones operating around the world.
What is Economic Zone Sustainable Recovery Strategies Award and Who was the Initiator of the Event?
The main goal of the award was to access the free economic zones around the globe, which effectively managed to overcome the COVID-19 pandemic. Companies were awarded in various categories by the designated jury for their ability to maintain sustainability by means of tailored policies and regulations and support the development of the companies operating in respective zones.
The Economic Zone Sustainable Recovery Strategies award was organized by influential international publication Investment Monitor. This publication combines the leading journalists and experts team of the business industry field. Investment Monitor worked on this project with joint efforts of Barcelona New Economy Week and Barcelona Zona Franca.
What are the Future Plans of Hualing Free Industrial Zone?
Pandemic remains in its active phase and makes strategy optimization rather complex for the global business representatives. In addition, it creates more bureaucratic obstacles. The delivery chain has become more complex, and logistics prices have grown, thus leading to growing prices of consumer products. Regardless, private sector activity around the world has increased, and it is gradually going back to the pre-pandemic conditions. Similar dynamics have been observed in the operations of Hualing FIZ during 2021.
Regardless of the fact, that due to the complexity of logistics, transportation problems and other similar reasons several projects of the FIZ have been suspended, many companies have successfully resumed their intensive operations. In addition, we have new recycling projects, including in plastic, construction material, wood, and furniture industries. These projects will be implemented starting from 2022.
It shall be noted that interest from companies representing different sectors and profiles has increased and now we are at the stage of active negotiations.
We have made an important decision in 2021. This decision implies expansion of FIZ- 22 hectares of land will be added to the zone. By taking this step, we aim at offering companies an unprecedented scale and quality in Georgia, both in terms of infrastructure and diversity of services.
FIZ has already prepared the area development concept. Now we are discussing strategic, technical, and legal details with the Ministry of Finance and Economy of Georgia. In near future, we will sign a new contract with the government and initiate infrastructural activities. We plan that FIZ with its new borders and infrastructures will be providing services to the companies starting from the first quarter of 2022.
Also, we are about to complete a new investment project, which involves the provision of electricity supply from Tskaltubo 220-watt substation to a newly established high voltage transmission line and substation in Hualing FIZ.
This project was implemented in the scope of the initiative and financial support of Hualing. As a result, we can offer electricity supply to the companies operating in the zone, and most importantly, this offer implies an exclusively low price.
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