Optics Valley of China. [Photo/WeChat account of Optics Valley of China] 

Since its establishment in 1988, the East Lake High-tech Development Zone (also known as Optics Valley of China, or OVC) in Wuhan, capital of Central China's Hubei province, has been striving to help the nation achieve scientific and technological self-reliance and self-improvement.

For decades, it has been home to the world's largest optical fiber and cable R&D and manufacturing base and largest optical device R&D and production base in China, as well as a small and medium-sized display panel industry base and laser industry base. 

In the provincial government work report recently released at the first session of the 14th Hubei Provincial People's Congress, many achievements were closely related to OVC. 

Over the past five years, it has made a number of significant achievements: 

Wuhan's nationally-influential science and technology innovation center was approved for construction in OVC. 

Two national technology innovation centers for digital construction, intelligent design and numerical control were put into operation in OVC. 

A number of landmark projects of new infrastructure such as the Wuhan Supercomputing Center were completed and put into use. 

The output value of its optical fiber, chip, screen, terminal and network industries exceeded 700 billion yuan ($103.29 billion). 

Fourteen international and national events were held in OVC. 

Work on the optimization and improvement project for pulsed strong magnetic field large scientific devices and all 187 major projects of the Optics Valley Science and Technology Innovation Corridor began. 

The Optoelectronic and Medical Equipment Science and Technology Park in OVC was selected as one of 10 pilot projects for the construction of future industrial science and technology parks in China. 

In the past five years, 460,000 industrial enterprises were connected to cloud services and 108 factories were connected to the 5G network. 

The Wuhan Optoelectronic Information Cluster and WuxiangShisui Automotive Cluster were selected as national advanced manufacturing clusters.

Development of four national strategic emerging industrial clusters, including integrated circuits and biomedicine, was accelerated.

Lastly, the number of national innovative industrial clusters reached 10, the third most in the country.