China - June 18, 2024

Storyline:
Low-altitude economy flies high in southwest Chinese city.

(Voice_over)

Southwest China's Chengdu City is advancing its low-altitude economy with extensive drone applications that include food delivery, firefighting and industrial production.

At a mountain resort located about 68 kilometers outside the city, drone food delivery is taking the camping experience to the next level.

What used to be an hour's drive to get amenities from downtown now takes just 10 minutes with a drone.

(Sound_bite)

Tourist:

"I craved hotpot today and ordered it through a drone delivery service. It arrived in about 10 minutes, which was surprisingly quick."

(Voice_over)

The development of the city's burgeoning low-altitude economy has been aided in large part by the establishment of the "Sky's Eye" - a national civil unmanned aviation test base.

With eight test sites and 14 major test scenarios, the base facilitates and manages the takeoff and landing of hundreds of UAVs ever day.

Chengdu is now home to 110 upstream and downstream enterprises in the drone industrial chain and forecasts that its low-altitude economy will be valued at more than 3.5 billion US dollars by the end of the year.

According to data from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, China's low-altitude economy was valued at nearly 70 billion U.S. dollars in 2023, up over 30 percent year on year.