Wanfeng Auto’s founder Chen Ailian advocates for general aviation industry at China’s National People's Congress

Mar 11, 2021 (China Knowledge) – During the two sessions of the National People's Congress, Chen Ailian, deputy to the National People's Congress and founder of Zhejiang Wanfeng Auto Wheel (002085) said the country’s manufacturing plays an important role in driving economic development where technological progress and innovations contributed 80%. In contrast, China’s manufacturing industry accounted for 32.45% of the country’s economy in 2016, followed by a volatile declining trend to 27.17% by 2019. One of the reasons is that the unbalanced development between China's manufacturing industry and the virtual economy over the years has led to a slowdown or even a decline in both the number of manufacturing employees and capital inflows.

Chen believes that China’s industrialization process is far from over and that it is important for the government to pay more attention in developing the manufacturing sector. She states that a new round of technological revolution will bring about new manufacturing, and there are plenty of room for further development.

Using Wanfeng as an example, Chen concisely narrated the company’s continuous improvement in its global R&D and manufacturing capabilities has helped Wanfeng to gain a world’s leading position in lightweight technologies and general aviation aircraft manufacturing.

Chen believes that in the face of new challenges she will endeavour to explore new development concept and accelerate the pace of transformation and upgrading of the industry.

General Aviation (GA)

Speaking about China’s general aviation (GA), Chen pointed out that in 2018 there were over 210,000 GA aircraft in the United States, of which over 80% are used for civilian purposes. But it created an economic output reaching USD 247 bln, and provided1.2 mln jobs serving over 19,000 take-off and landing facilities for general aviation. As a comparison, in that same period, China had only a few thousand GA aircraft and a few hundred GA airports.

According to Chen, this large gap means there is enormous potential for growth. In recent years, China’s GA market has developed faster than the rest of the world. From 2014 to 2019, the average annual growth rate of China's general aircraft ownership reached 14.2%.

With the improvement of living standards, Chen believes that there will be a rapid increase in demand for GA aircraft, especially after the gradual opening of low altitude airspace.

According to her, if China’s per capita fleet of GA aircraft reaches the level of the United States, the trillion RMB worth GA market will become another important engine to fuel China's economic growth.

Aviation Sports

According to Chen, China's basic format for aviation sports has already taken form and the economic scale of the aviation sports industry has reached RMB 200 bln. 2,000 flight camps have established, and 1,000 aviation clubs created with 20 mln participants. In the next 15 years, the opening of China's low altitude airspace should lead to explosive growth of the GA industry.

Chen depicts three prospects of aviation sports in the structure of China’s economy.

Firstly, the general aviation industry and the sports industry should be deeply integrated and develop into a new industry. The low-altitude tourism projects also provide new business opportunities for the tourism industry;

Secondly, aviation sports events and aviation flight camps can enrich and improve the leisure lifestyle for millions of population; thus, boosting spending and consumption.

Thirdly, the growth of aviation sports expects to catalyse the formation of a trillion-RMB market that will naturally drive up GA aircraft manufacturing and supporting industries.

Stating the current challenges Chen also said, due to the low altitude control, lack of ground support and shortage of required talents, China's GA development lags. She suggests to deepen the supply side structural reform of the aviation sports industry and strengthen policy support. She strongly recommends to standardize the management of laws and regulations in the aviation sports industry and improve its safety supervision and management system.

If her recommendations are drafted into the new 14th Five-Year Plan, Zhejiang Wanfeng Auto Wheel, being a major in GA industry and owning the world’s third largest GA aircraft brand “Diamond”, is poised to take off and benefit from the emerging trillion-RMB market.