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Japanese lessons: China’s ‘Greater Bay Area’ to look to Tokyo Bay for inspiration
- Business group arranges networking forum in prosperous Japanese region
- Home to a third of the country’s GDP, area ‘very successful in building up a strong manufacturing supply chain and an industrial belt’, says group leader
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It is often touted as an attempt to ape California’s Silicon Valley, but China’s “Greater Bay Area” is to look east for inspiration and collaboration, with its top political and business leaders set to visit the Tokyo Bay Area in April against a backdrop of warmer Sino-Japanese relations.
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Observers said the potential collaboration could capitalise on the improving ties, as the US-China trade war rumbles on and President Donald Trump’s “America first” strategy threatens Tokyo’s interests.
Jonathan Choi Koon-shum, chairman of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Bay Area Entrepreneurs Union, said his group was organising a networking forum in Toyko Bay. The leaders of Hong Kong and Macau, Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor and Fernando Chui Sai-on, as well as Ma Xingrui, governor of Guangdong province, would attend, he said.
That would mean representation from the three governments involved in the Greater Bay Area, a national development strategy to integrate Hong Kong, Macau and nine Guangdong cities into an innovation powerhouse.
“The Greater Bay Area is a new bay area. We want to learn from the successful experiences of the Tokyo Bay Area,” Choi, who sits on the standing committee of Beijing’s top political advisory body, said. “The Tokyo one is very successful in building up a strong manufacturing supply chain and an industrial belt.”
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