Georgia plants its China flag in … Qingdao? | www.myajc.com

QINGDAO, China — Every evening Qingdao’s beaches fill with bathers who wade in the sandy waters, many fully clothed. On shore, muscular old men do squats and stretch, as they have for decades. Back then, this northeastern coastal Chinese town was all low-level seaside resorts, slow-moving bicycles and retirees.

Nowadays, throngs of holiday makers pack the beaches, mucky but clean by Chinese standards, and high-rises tower over what was sand less than two decades ago. They gorge on local seafood and guzzle the namesake Tsingdao beer, made at the brewery established in 1903 by German settlers.

The boom has drawn business to Qingdao, too, along with one brand-new player planting its flag: the state of Georgia.

Gov. Nathan Deal, accompanied by more than 50 state officials and business leaders, last week opened the first commercial office of any U.S. state in Qingdao, in Shandong Province. Abandoning its previous outpost in Beijing, the state is shifting from past trade efforts to a broader program of soliciting investment, product promotion and tourism sales.

“We want to be known as a state (that) is willing to reach out to parts of China that perhaps have not been considered to be the place of primary importance by other states,” Deal said in an exclusive interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, hours prior to the opening ceremony at the headquarters of Hisense, one of China’s biggest companies.

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