Xiamen's service outsourcing industry reports stable growth in 2020. [Photo/xmnn.cn] 

Xiamen's service outsourcing industry reported stable growth in 2020, according to a development report recently released by the city's commerce bureau.

Statistics show that the contract value of Xiamen's offshore service outsourcing business totaled 53.38 billion yuan ($8.23 billion) in 2020, a year-on-year increase of 13.3 percent, 4.9 percentage points higher the national growth rate, while the value of its executed contracts stood at 33.08 billion yuan last year, representing a year-on-year increase of 8.4 percent.

Outsourcing is the business practice of hiring a party outside a company to perform services and make goods traditionally undertaken by the company's employees. Xiamen's service outsourcing industry has become a new driver for the city's economic restructuring and upgrading, helping the city achieve innovative development.

In recent years, Xiamen has ramped up efforts to promote the development of its service outsourcing industry, which has encouraged industrial transformation and upgrading both within the city and in surrounding areas.

According to official data, the service outsourcing industry in areas such as biological research and development, inspection and detection, and cloud computing saw sharp growth last year, which in turn boosted the development of Xiamen's high-tech industries, including integrated circuits and biological medicine.

Local authorities have said that Xiamen will conduct bold trials and experiments and seize upon opportunities created by the central government's policies, including the launch of the BRICS Partnership on the New Industrial Revolution innovation center in Xiamen, in a bid to promote the opening-up of its service outsourcing industry.