The number of newly registered enterprises in the pilot free trade zone (FTZ) of south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region reached nearly 17,000 in the first half (H1) of 2021, up 400 percent year on year, local authorities said on Wednesday.

More than 40 percent of the newly registered enterprises are engaged in fields including modern financial services, smart logistics, eco-chemical industries, electronic information and bio-pharmaceutical industries, according to the pilot FTZ's administration office.

Initial estimate shows that the actualized use of foreign investment in the zone stood at about 480 million U.S. dollars, up 752 percent year on year and accounting for 57 percent of the region's total.

Meanwhile, the pilot FTZ also saw its foreign trade value exceed 100 billion yuan (about 15.47 billion U.S. dollars), up 34 percent and contributing 35 percent to the autonomous region's total import and export value.

The pilot FTZ has rolled out a series of measures to complete its pilot tasks for reform and launched pilot projects in terms of cross-border finance, market purchase trade and cross-border e-commerce, said the office.

In April, the China-ASEAN Business Center officially opened in Nanning Area of the FTZ, which aims to provide one-stop services for China-ASEAN economic cooperation.