MACAU BUSINESS
depends upon how discrepancies among the legal systems of the three places could be resolved. “Without addressing the legal problems, I am not optimistic about [the development] of the Greater Bay Area,” said Ms. Chou, a rare remark for a local political heavyweight to cast doubt upon this regional vision.
The published outline of the development plan, however,
offers few concrete solutions to address these differences. Financial news agency Bloomberg columnist Nisha Gopalan criticised that the plan provides few new insights into the positioning of each city in the area. “The fundamental obstacles to the integration of Hong
Kong and Macau into a Mainland Chinese economic cluster go largely unaddressed,” she wrote in an opinion piece, noting by way of example the differences in the taxation systems and which systems businessmen and professionals could be subject to being left unattended. “The blueprint’s failure…suggests either that the Bay Area plan is more hype than practical programme or that political objectives will trump economic considerations,” she said.
Communication problems
The last chapter of the plan outline concerns implementation, stating that a group for area development will be set up to ‘examine and resolve major issues concerning policy implementation, project arrangements, breakthroughs in systems and mechanisms, and the development of co- operation platforms,’ adding the three sides should ‘proactively co-ordinate and co-operate among themselves on the basis of mutual respect, and
jointly formulate and pursue specific plans.’ Hong Kong-based political commentator Yuen Kee Wang,
however, thinks the vision remains “vague”. While some actions and measures could be achieved by the respective
Administrations, measures requiring the co-operation of the three sides remain a challenge, he said. “[The outline] says three sides should enhance
communication and report to the central government in case of major issues but it doesn’t clearly state how [any measures requiring co-operation] could be followed up,” he said. “The document says the three sides should respect and enhance co-ordination, showing that there have been problems.”
Self-protection
The concept of the Greater Bay Area is indeed not a novel idea: it can be dated back decades earlier when Hong Kong scholar Woo Chia Wei first raised the possibility of setting up a city cluster in the region. Years later the central government proposed the so-called co-operation of the Pan-Pearl River Delta region in 2003, with a development plan outline published in 2008 covering the period until 2020.
The results of regional co-operation over the years,
however, have been far from satisfactory due to differences in the systems of the three places and the lack of initiatives for co-operation, say critics, although Lin Zhijun, Dean of the School of Business at the Macau University of Science and Technology, strikes a more positive tone. “The content of the outline of the Greater Bay Area is
comprehensive, and the Administrations [of the three sides] have to go beyond thinking of self-protection and be committed to the consensus of developing the Greater Bay Area,” he says. “There is one country, two systems, and three currencies and customs territories in the Greater Bay Area… [All sides] have to work together to overcome the barriers … for better and genuine integration … The outline has assigned different positions for each city, which should avoid competition but co-operate and complement each other.” As the outline covers the period until 2035, some believe
there is still time to discuss in detail how this grand vision can be turned into reality. Ieong Tou Hong, Vice-chairman of Guangdong’s Association for Promotion of Co-operation between Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macau, stressed that the measures and actions of the outline will gradually be put in place in several phases. He acknowledges that if some of the current rules cannot be improved it will be difficult to push the plan forward, saying: “Macau has to table its own suggestions, ideas and targets during the process. [All sides] have to complement advantages and share interests for the co-operation to be sustainable.”
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