ing more than 60 countries and its effects will take years to surface for
some countries. The impact of the Greater Bay Area on Hong Kong
is imminent.”
Compared with the Xiongan New Area, a planned special econom-
ic zone southwest of Beijing, Wang Fuqiang said the construction of
the Greater Bay Area represents a new horizon for exploration. The
Xiongan New Area is located inland, where the market economy is
weak and interest groups have yet to emerge and where the cost of
reform is low. It is easy to develop the region quickly through heavy
and fast investment. The Greater Bay Area, however, represents mod-
ern China where the market economy dominates, constituting a new
experiment to seek the new driving forces for further development.
“The prosperity of Hong Kong and Macau has been heavily depen-
dent on the support and preferential policies of the central govern-
ment. Their economies need to be quickly put on the path of endog-
enous growth driven by innovation and industrial chain integration,”
Wang said.
Challenges Ahead
Many experts interviewed by ChinaReport argued that in the Great-
er Bay Area, the Two Systems are the two sides of the same coin and
both sides face the same problems of customs clearance, immigra-
tion and quarantine inspection, requiring deepening integration and
a new phase of coordinated development.
Guo Wanda told our reporter that many seminars and conferences
were held in Hong Kong in the run up to the 20th anniversary of its
handover to China and he had to commute regularly between Hong
Kong and the Chinese mainland, but it remains very inconvenient for
the general public to clear customs.
Official statistics showed that each year, over 200 million people
entered Hong Kong through customs in Shenzhen, which means
650,000 people cross the border on average every day. It is expected
that the volume will reach more than 1 million people by 2027. Ad-
dressing the needs of the growing numbers crossing the border will
be a challenge.
Guo Wanda recommended an integration experiment by first
cancelling the telephone roaming charges between the cities in the
Greater Bay Area. What’s more, he said, Hong Kong and Macau resi-
dents who work and live in mainland cities should be entitled to the
same treatment as locals, including taxation, education, medical care,
housing purchase rights and even the right to sit civil service exams.
He said many problems stem not from the law but from executive
power, poor administration and human factors. And the key to ad-
dressing the problems lies in deepening the coordination between the
central government and local places and breaking the monopolies of
different departments, to make the lives of the general public easier.
“Countries within the European Union have easy access to each
other and it remains a question as to whether this mode could be
practised under One Country, Two Systems. The good news is that
research into this is under way,” Guo said. “The biggest challenge is
how to give full use of the advantage of One Country to address the
problems of Two Systems. Another is how to coordinate and plan
when different systems and laws are involved.”
Wang likes to divide the cooperation between Hong Kong, Macau
and Guangdong Province into four periods. From the early 1980s
when the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone was established, cross-
border processing and trade broke ground. In 2003, the Closer Eco-
nomic Partnership Arrangement was signed, facilitating trade and
investment for the economic cooperation of Hong Kong and the
mainland. In 2015, the Guangdong Free-Trade Zone came into ef-
fect, further liberating free trade, the service industry and the Internet
economy.
“The Greater Bay Area should be the fourth period of cooperation
if institutional innovation, deepening integration and free trade are
attained,” said Wang, suggesting the introduction and coordination
of a support system on the national level to establish a uniform and
open market in the region.
Wang said the first period of Reform and Opening Up has reached
its ceiling. China’s second Reform and Opening Up is likely to take
off if the central government has the political determination to autho-
rise the Greater Bay Area with more power to deepen reform.
“In Shenzhen, for example, bold experiments with local legislation
should be encouraged and an environment created where mistakes
and failures can be tolerated, thus revitalising the zeal of reform,” he
said. “What we need to do now is kindle the flame.”- Zaoqing
- Foshan
- Guangzhou
- Huizhou
- Dongguan
- Zhongshan
- Shenzhen
- Jiangmen
- Zhuhai
- Macau
- Hong Kong