China’s propaganda chief calls for better understanding about the Greater Bay Area, and says high-quality reporting is essential to its future success
- Top Communist Party official Huang Kunming makes suggestions at first media summit on region
- Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam calls for reporting to be ‘fair, objective and fact-based’
China’s propaganda chief has called for greater global understanding of the country’s ambitious Greater Bay Area mega-plan through the key role played by the media in telling the story, while Hong Kong’s leader and Beijing’s top representative in the city noted the need for comprehensive coverage that should include its problems as well as merits.
Top officials gathered in Guangzhou on Sunday put the focus on getting the story right as they held the first media summit on the bay area, which aims to transform Hong Kong, Macau and nine Guangdong cities into a world-class urban cluster and an innovation and technology powerhouse rivalling Silicon Valley by 2035.
Following up on the release of the project blueprint in February, Huang Kunming, Politburo member and head of the Communist Party’s propaganda department, told an audience of mostly media executives and professionals that world-class news outlets producing high-quality reports were essential to the bay area plan.
“I hope news organisations can focus on the development of the Greater Bay Area and join forces to tell the stories of today’s China well … to tell the stories of how ‘one country, two systems’ has been successfully implemented in Hong Kong and Macau,” he said, referring to Beijing’s governing principle for the two former colonies.
“The stories of Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macau seeking development through collaboration and innovation [should also be told].”
