By Omer Bilal Islamabad, Nov 08 (INP-WealthPK) The Punjab government has signed the “Five Sister Cities’’ agreement with China to strengthen local infrastructure and economic ties among the sister cities. The five sister cities include Faisalabad-Qingdao, Rawalpindi-Wuhan, Bahawalpur-Nanjing, Taxila-Datong, and Multan-Xian. The two sides decided to develop Faisalabad as a primary commercial centre through joint ventures. In this regard, an agreement was signed between Qingdao city and Faisalabad on Oct 21. Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting Farrukh Habib confirmed the signing of the 'Sister City Agreement' between China's Qingdao city and Faisalabad. In a tweet, he said the agreement will lead to cooperation in different areas, including industry, people-to-people exchanges, business-to-business cooperation, culture, tourism, education and science and technology. “This cooperation is an important source of civic diplomacy,” he said, adding that bilateral cooperation with China will continue with the same enthusiasm. Talking with INP-Wealth PK, Farrukh said Faisalabad was an industrial city with the first-rate road infrastructure, textile hub, agricultural land and especially Allama Iqbal Economic Zone. Allama Iqbal Industrial City (AIIC) is a priority SEZ and is being developed on approximately 3,217 acres. As a textile industrial city, Faisalabad has one of the largest development budgets in the country with US$5 billion worth of exports from textile made-ups and a contribution of over 10 per cent to Punjab's GDP and an average annual GDP (nominal) of US$20.5 billion. He said the Faisalabad-Qingdao agreement will be equipped with more investment in Allama Iqbal Industrial Zone, which will create more than 250,000 jobs and attract PKR400 billion investment in automobiles, value-added textiles, engineering, pharmaceuticals, food processing, chemicals and construction sectors. The agreement seeks to enhance existing cooperation between Faisalabad and Qingdao, and to explore more avenues by expanding two-way investment and trade. Recently, 11 joint tasks have been mounted in Faisalabad, which will lead to the exploration of new areas for future cooperation to enhance exports. Qingdao is a major seaport and naval base, as well as a centre for commercial and economic activities. This city has rapidly become a hub for regional economy and trade and has also hosted many international conferences like the SCO Summit in 2018. It is the centre of multinational companies such as Haier and Hisense. Many local companies of Qingdao are operating in Pakistan in the electronics, agriculture, and service sectors. Faisalabad is the industrial belt and home to the largest agricultural university in Pakistan and as well of Asia, while many Chinese local companies are working in the fields of electronics, agriculture and services in Pakistan.