Playing a different tune

The burgeoning interest in musical instrument manufacturing has also drawn several Western companies to Wuqiang. To date, there are three big Western musical instrument companies in Wuqiang that have invested about $729 million.

Among them, the under-construction project from GEWA, a large German company founded in 1925, is the biggest. The company plans to invest 1.56 billion yuan to build factories in the zone, which can produce 200,000 sets of drums, 150,000 sets of electronic drums, 100,000 guitars and other products every year.

"The project will allow the company to provide products for 150 companies in China, and the annual output value will be about 3 billion yuan," Yu Shaofeng, the management committee deputy director, says. "The output value this year is expected to be about 500 million yuan."

The first phase of the project started pilot production last year, and the entire project is expected to be complete by 2015.

However, there are also signs that like the rest of China, Wuqiang is also looking to move up the value chain by shifting to high-end products. Chen Xuekong, the manager from the Jinyin Group, says that most of the products manufactured in the county are low-end products, more suited for training process.