Wynne's China mission brings Ontario 230 new jobs

Three companies based in Jiangsu province will invest $130 million in Ontario to create 230 new jobs, Wynne announced Monday while on a trade mission in China.

Thestar.com
Oct. 27, 2014
By Robert Benzie


Ontario’s sister province in China is lending Premier Kathleen Wynne a helping hand on job creation.

Two companies based in Jiangsu province will invest $60 million in Ontario to create 130 new jobs, Wynne announced Monday.

At the same time, Canadian Solar Solutions has signed a $70-million deal to do green energy projects here that will generate 100 more manufacturing jobs in Ontario.

The move came hours after Wynne arrived in Nanjing, the eight-million-strong provincial capital, via an ultra-modern 300-km/h high-speed train from Shanghai.

Jiangsu Huayi Technology Co. said it will spend $40 million to create 40 jobs in the medical sector in an Ontario community still to be determined.

At the same time, the Suzhou Xingya Investment Co. is investing $20 million on a new steel nail manufacturing plant in Kitchener, which will mean some 80 new factory jobs in a region that can use them.

“Ontario and Jiangsu have spent decades building our strong partnership, in the business world and also in the academic world,” Wynne said in a speech to 300 officials at the gleaming new 56-storey marble-and-glass Jinling Hotel, which is owned by the Jiangsu provincial government.

“I am so pleased that our relationship continues to flourish and create mutual growth and more new jobs in each of our provinces,” said the premier, who arrived for a week-long trade mission on Sunday.

She made her comments after a meeting with Jiangsu vice-governor Xu Ming.

In an interview Monday, Ontario’s Minister of Economic Development Brad Duguid, who visited Jiangsu early last year on Dalton McGuinty’s final official trip as premier, said the Chinese province has “a special relationship with Ontario.”

“They tend to bend over backwards to help us,” said Duguid, noting the concept of sister jurisdictions is far from just a ceremonial thing here.

“Here in China, they take twinning seriously,” he said. “Having a focus on Jiangsu province is very helpful.”

Later Monday, Duguid will meet with officials at the Nanjing Automobile Co., a huge firm that, among other brands, now owns the venerable British marques MG, Rover, Austin and Morris.

“I can tell them what expertise Ontario has to offer as the only jurisdiction anywhere that has five different companies manufacturing vehicles,” he said, referring to General Motors, Ford, Chrysler, Toyota and Honda.

Jimmy Jin, the general manager of Jiangsu Huayi Technology, said in a statement that Ontario is a good fit for his firm because of its “abundant energy reserves.”

“Its cost-competitiveness meets our need for electricity and natural gas consumed in our production process,” said Jin.

“Ontario also has a highly qualified workforce that fulfils our needs, and funding and tax incentives that encourage the research and development of advanced technology. These are the reasons why we chose Ontario as our preferred destination for overseas investment,” he said.

In all, delegates from the 60 Ontario science and technology firms travelling with Wynne inked 13 agreements in China on Monday.

As well, the premier, who is visiting Nanjing University to hold a roundtable with students on an Ontario-Jiangsu exchange, will formalize a new work plan for the six-year-old Ontario-Jiangsu Business Council, which promotes economic ties.

The two provinces will mark the 30th anniversary of twinning next year: a relationship forged under former premier Bill Davis and cemented in part by current Toronto mayoral front-runner John Tory, who travelled here in 1985.

Citizenship, Immigration and International Trade Minister Michael Chan, who moved to Toronto from Hong Kong as a teenager in 1969 and has made some 60 business trips back to China since, stressed such long-standing relationships are crucial to doing business here.

“The key now is for government and industry to work together to follow up and turn the goodwill between our economies into good jobs for Ontarians,” said Chan, who is warmly welcomed by Chinese officials wherever he goes here.