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CONNECTING
Hong Kong with Macau and Zhuhai is an old
idea because it has always been desirable
to have better links with both sides of
the Pearl River that inconveniently splits
Guangdong province into distant halves.
While
there are many short sea connections, the
idea of another land route to the Chinese
hinterland has had strong appeal, noted
in a recent article published by the Massachusetts-based
American Journal of Transportation.
Beyond
moving people, the idea of another land
crossing has economic appeal to Hong Kong's
land challenged business community. Hong
Kong's economy is already tied to mainland
China and especially to the Pearl River
Delta (PRD) region.
The
9+2 Pan PRD region, which includes the nine
southern provinces plus Macau and Hong Kong,
is China's most economically developed area.
The region's 400 million people had a GDP
growth of 8.1 per cent (excluding Macau
and Hong Kong) in 2012, as well as a per
capita GDP of US$15,100 (2011) and exports
of $991.5 billion.
From
a larger perspective, Hong Kong's relationship
with China through CEPA (Closer Economic
Partnership Arrangement), which is in essence
a free trade agreement, acts as a springboard
for both cross-border trade and investment.
In
China's 12th Five-Year Plan, a chapter was
dedicated to Beijing's support for Hong
Kong as a financial, trading and logistic
hub. Hong Kong is already the largest source
of foreign direct investment (FDI) for China
enterprises at more than $629 billion or
47 per cent of FDI by the end of June 2013.
The
initial seabed feasibility work on the Hongkong
Zhuhai Macau Bridge (HZMB) started in 2007,
and in 2009, Beijing, Hong Kong and Macau
agreed to finance 22 per cent with the rests
coming from loans of around $8.4 billion
from banking syndicates led by the Bank
of China.
HZMB
construction began in December 2009 on the
Guangdong side and 2011 on the Hong Kong
side with an opening planned for 2016. The
bridge and tunnel will link the less developed
western Guangdong region with Hong Kong,
swinging along the north side of Lantau
Island and Hong Kong International Airport.
The
rapid development of the region, in particular
Hong Kong and neighbouring Shenzhen, has
begun hitting limits of practical expansion.
However, the southwestern part of the Guangdong
province near Zhuhai across from Macau holds
untapped potential within easy reach of
China, Hong Kong and global markets.
Structurally,
the China market is changing, and a "new
China" strategy for many companies
is evolving. Part of the change is that
the "Go West" campaign that was
started back in 2001 to encourage investment
in export-oriented factories away from the
coast and into the hinterland has begun
to catch on.
Henriette
Hallberg Thygesen, CEO for Damco, Maersk's
standalone forwarding arm, said: "I
began working in China in 2002, and the
Go West plan was already in place but nobody
went...now it's really taking off."
Besides
the geographical element, another feature
of the change is that China as purely an
exporter has given way to China both as
an importer and exporter. Dr Thygesen said
with the emergence of the Chinese consumers,
Damco as a logistics provider is building
new products to service a vastly more complex
logistics system than the old one with the
pure export model only.
Hong
Kong's role in the China supply chain has
also changed with the rise of the Chinese
consumers. Andrew Davis, associate director
general for Invest Hong Kong, explained
how the changes in China have impacted logistics
and trade in just the past one and a half
years.
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