FIFTEEN executives and presidents of international organizations and multinationals were recruited by Guangdong Province to be advisers at this year’s provincial conference on future economic development which began yesterday in Guangzhou.

One-third of the advisers and the conference’s seven observers, who are also mainly high-level executives of multinational companies, are from tertiary industries, including four from the financial sector, according to Zhong Yangsheng, vice Guangdong governor and head of the biannual conference’s organizing committee.

“The composition of the advisers has shown the province’s determination to build Guangdong into an economic power by upgrading its economic structure,” said Zhong.

He said the theme of this year’s conference was “innovation,” in line with the topics of “sustainable development” in 2005 and “international competitiveness” in 2003.

The government held a banquet at the White Swan Hotel on Wednesday night for the advisers, to thank them for attending the conference and contributing to the province’s development.

Among the 15 advisers, Carl-Henric Svanberg, president and CEO of Sweden’s Ericsson, attended the conference for the third time. He said it was a great honor for him to serve as an adviser to the Guangdong Government.

“Innovation is an interesting topic and main driving force in today’s economic development. I am happy that the government has been very trend-sensitive, which also tells its determination to maintain its global competitiveness,” said Svanberg.

He said he had prepared a number of suggestions for the conference, but declined to reveal them.

The 15 advisers and seven observers met the provincial officials at yesterday’s closed-door conference, offering advice on how the government should steer its economic engine.

The province has achieved great economic success in the past two decades, and has been dubbed the “world factory.” It manufactures everything from daily commodities to toys at very competitive prices, attracting buyers from all over the world.

However, that economic development mode has encountered a bottleneck in recent years in the face of a series of social and environmental problems.

The continuously rising labor costs have greatly weakened the province’s competitiveness in the global market, while the labor-intensive manufacturing business has consumed a great deal of energy and other resources. The fast development of the economy without proper attention to ecological protection has also lead to deterioration of the environment.

Zhong said the provincial government felt four years ago the urge to restructure its economy from labor-intensive manufacturing to knowledge-based service to enable it to achieve sustainable development while improving the environment. (Claudia Wei)