China’s push for closer US ties to focus on Greater Bay Area, Yangtze economic hubs
The Greater Bay Area will be among major economic hubs in focus as China seeks to drive people-to-people ties with the United States in the new year, the head of a key semi-official Chinese foreign affairs body has said.
China’s push for closer US ties to focus on Greater Bay Area, Yangtze economic hubs
Geurasia

China’s push for closer US ties to focus on Greater Bay Area, Yangtze economic hubs

Photo: AFP/Brendan Smialowski
Eurasia 07/01/2024 11:19

The Greater Bay Area will be among major economic hubs in focus as China seeks to drive people-to-people ties with the United States in the new year, the head of a key semi-official Chinese foreign affairs body has said.

Yang Wanming, president of the Chinese People’s Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries (CPAFFC), said there was “vast room” for collaboration between the southern Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau Greater Bay Area megalopolis with the San Francisco and New York City bay areas, South China Morning Post reported.

There was also similar potential for cooperation between the Yangtze River Economic Belt and the Mississippi River Basin, Yang told state backed digital outlet The Paper.

Apart from Hong Kong and Macau, the Greater Bay Area covers nine megacities in China’s prosperous Guangdong province, including tech hub Shenzhen. The eastern Yangtze River Economic Belt, centred around Shanghai, covers 11 provinces and municipalities along the world’s third longest river.
AFP/Jade Gao

“Our association will continue to coordinate and advance mutual visits and exchanges between those [US and Chinese] regions, promoting regional economic development and delivering tangible development interests to more local areas in both countries,” Yang said in the interview.

This would be part of broader efforts this year by the CPAFFC – which is tasked with boosting friendly overseas exchanges – to expand civil and subnational China-US ties as the two countries mark 45 years of diplomatic relations.

The Chinese foreign ministry also highlighted Beijing’s readiness “to work with the US to … jointly promote people-to-people exchanges” and commitment to a “stable, sound and sustainable” relationship with Washington.

Citing the in-person meeting between Xi and Biden in November, the ministry said the two leaders had “fostered a future-oriented San Francisco vision, which points the way forward for bilateral relations”.

#US #China
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