SHENZHEN, Feb. 9 (Xinhua) -- South China's tech hub of Shenzhen, home to the leading global drone maker DJI, has to date opened a total of 310 low-altitude logistics routes, with 82 new routes added in 2025, according to the ongoing annual session of the municipal people's congress.

Staff members debug a food delivery drone on the top floor of a shopping mall in Shenzhen, south China's Guangdong Province, April 23, 2024. (File photo: Xinhua)

Official data published during the meeting on Monday shows that Shenzhen has built more than 1,200 low-altitude takeoff and landing facilities as the city accelerates the development of its low-altitude economy.

The city in Guangdong Province now stands as a leading manufacturing base for unmanned aerial vehicles, producing 70 percent of China's consumer drones and 50 percent of its industrial drones.

The expansion of Shenzhen's low-altitude sector is fueled by the city's increasing investment in sci-tech innovation. From 2020 to 2024, Shenzhen's total R&D investment grew from 151.08 billion yuan (about 21.73 billion U.S. dollars) to 245.31 billion yuan, representing an average annual growth of 12.9 percent.

China's low-altitude economy has gained substantial momentum since being recognized as a new growth driver in the 2024 government work report.

The Civil Aviation Administration of China has projected that the country's low-altitude economy reached a market scale of 1.5 trillion yuan last year and will climb to 3.5 trillion yuan by 2035.