Recently, the province published the list of the first 2 batches of typical cases for the three "No.1 projects" for promoting the innovation, deepening the reform, overcoming the challenges in the opening-up, and improving the implementation, the Inclusive Cooperation for Lithium Development- Huayou Cobalt's Engagement in the "Belt and Road" Initiative for a Community with a Shared Future of our city was selected as the only typical case in Jiaxing in the category "No.1 project" for the production enhancement and upgrading driven by the "Sweet Potato Economy". 

Thousands of miles away in Zimbabwe 

In Mashonaland (in the east of Zimbabwe), the busy production line completes the whole process of crushing, sieving, selection and removal of impurities and turns raw ores to crude ores, rough concentrates and then concentrates. 

At the beginning of July, PLZ subsidiary of Huayou Cobalt was formally put into operation, and Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa, the President of Zimbabwe, inaugurated the project. With the largest single investment of Huayou Cobalt in Africa, the project took only 9 months to be completed and put into production, which also marked a great progress made by Huayou Cobalt  in construction of lithium battery projects, industrial layout, and space expansion. 

The "Sweet Potato", with their roots deep in the soil, are branching out into other regions. Turn the clock back to 2003, where were the resource needed for the future? What was the direction of future development? Obsessed with the two challenges, Chen Xuehua, the President of Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt Co., Ltd, flied to Africa with a translator employed on loan and started the company's international business arrangement. 

After many years, Huayou Cobalt has built its African management headquarters, as well as subsidiaries such as CDM and MIKAS in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and established an integrated resource development system of cobalt and copper. 

In the context of the accelerated reform of lithium battery cathode materials towards high-nickel, Huayou Cobalt initiated a new and ambitious round of industry chain expansion overseas. Huayou Cobalt identified Nickel and lithium as its new "engine". 

In 2018, Huayou Cobalt started its business of nickel ores exploitation and smelting in Indonesia. The projects it invested in Indonesia, including Huayue and Huafei, made it an early bird in the planning of medium nickel resources in the field of battery materials and earned high recognition of Indonesian government and strong support from the local region. 

Now, with fleets carrying raw materials back to China for the guarantee of Huayou Cobalt projects in Guangxi, Chengdu and other regions, the strength, stability and extension of the industry chain will further show its importance. 

With overseas projects spreading over the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Indonesia and Zimbabwe, Huayou Cobalt possesses the resources of key raw materials such as nickel, cobalt and lithium, and completes its business arrangement worldwide with headquarters in Tongxiang, , manufacturing base in China, resource guarantee overseas, and market in the world. In addition, it builds a close-looped ecology of industry chain for new energy lithium battery that integrates development of nickel, cobalt and lithium resources, green refining of non-ferrous metals, deep-processing of anode materials for lithium battery and resource recycling. 

Huayou Cobalt has built strategic cooperation with multiple enterprises, both domestic and foreign, following the idea of "cooperation for a shared future". It works with Vale, Ford, Volkswagen (China) and other partners to plan for and investment in new projects overseas, and introduce foreign capital by establishing joint ventures with LG, POSCO and other enterprises in China to co-build an internationally competitive industry chain of new energy lithium battery materials. 

Taking advantages of the "Belt and Road" Initiative, Huayou Cobalt always sticks to the idea of "discussion, co-building and sharing". It promoted the export of advantageous production capacity, advanced equipment and applicable technologies, and signed memorandum of understanding with several Indonesian universities to innovate the talent training mode; actively participated in impactful public welfare programs in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, including building community schools and making donation to orphanages; and shared the fruit of high-quality development with the local by providing jobs for over 3,000 local Zimbabweans. In this year, Huayou Cobalt has been honored as a Top 10 international investing enterprise in Zhejiang. 

It is learned that, the cases were shortlisted by the Organization Department of the provincial government and will be demonstrated "in classrooms and textbooks". The inclusion of Huayou Cobalt is an example of Tongxiang's further implementation of "Sweet Potato Economy" and upgrading "No.1 Opening-up Project" for higher production capacity.  

In recent years, when approaching a higher level of opening up, Tongxiang created a rapid growth mode of "both the markets and resources overseas", and achieved feats of the "Sweet Potato Economy" characterized by opening-up and development one after another.