Beijing official visits Greater Bay Area cities to explore integrating Hong Kong

Xia Baolong (centre) visits the Guangzhou Tianhe Hong Kong and Macao Youth Association during his trip.

Photo: Handout Beijing’s top official overseeing Hong Kong and Macau affairs has concluded a five-day fact-finding trip to three mainland Chinese cities in the Greater Bay Area to explore ways of deepening the international financial hub’s integration into the national blueprint.

The Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office announced that its director, Xia Baolong, had visited Guangzhou, Zhaoqing and Foshan on a trip running from Monday to Friday, accompanied by officials from the mainland and Hong Kong. “[The trip] focused on how to deepen the integration of Hong Kong and Macau into the national development strategy, including the 15th five-year plan,” it said. “[Xia also] conducted research on how [the cities] could deeply participate in the construction of the [bay area] and better serve the overall national development strategy.” The bay area is Beijing’s initiative to turn Hong Kong, Macau and nine southern mainland cities into an integrated economic and business hub.

Guangdong province’s capital, Guangzhou, is a core region for advanced manufacturing industries, while Foshan has positioned itself as a hi-tech industrial development hub, with the construction of a new airport starting earlier this week.

Meanwhile, Zhaoqing acts as a strategic “green” manufacturing base that is known for its new energy vehicles industry.

The office also released a photo showing Xia visiting the Guangzhou Tianhe Hong Kong and Macau Youth Association, which provides entrepreneurial support and incubation services to young people from Hong Kong and Macau who are looking to establish start-ups on the mainland.

During the trip, Xia spent time speaking with young people about their career prospects in cross-border business, according to a politician who joined him on the trip but asked not to be named.

The director also made a stop at the Foshan Foreign-related Public Legal Service Centre, with a photo from the office showing Xia receiving a briefing on the place, in the company of Hong Kong Deputy Secretary for Justice Cheung Kwok-kwan.

原文链接: 南华早报