Hong Kong business groups, mainland Chinese authorities team up to open new commercial services centre in Guangdong

Mainland Chinese authorities and Hong Kong business leaders have teamed up to launch a new social and commercial services centre in Guangdong province.

Sixteen local business, professional and policy research groups will station representatives at the centre, which is designed to help city residents who want to work, study or live on the mainland, as well as NGOs interested in operating across the border.

The groups behind the new centre include the Hong Kong General Chamber of Commerce, the Federation of Hong Kong Industries, the Hong Kong Coalition of Professional Services and the One Country Two Systems Research Institute.

At the centre’s launch on Monday, former Hong Kong leader Leung Chun-ying, one of its key proponents, described the project as the first of its kind.

“This is the first time that a large number of [business groups] have come together to create an environment [of cross-border collaboration] under the same roof with their Guangdong counterparts,” he said.

“Our goal is to foster the budding of a Hong Kong community. Through policy studies in Guangdong, and explaining proposals to the province and Hong Kong, we will resolve problems that are currently unknown. We don’t have to move Hong Kong’s economic and trade activities to Nansha, but we can supplement each other with our strengths, and create new industries with our chemistry.”

While the Hong Kong government and local trade unions have previously set up offices on the mainland, academics and the local business owners they are intended to serve have long complained of inadequate support, calling for more direct channels of dialogue with mainland experts and bureaucrats.

The Guangzhou government responded by establishing the Consultative Committee on Guangdong-Hong Kong Cooperation in Nansha in April. The committee, which oversees the centre, is a government-to-business body with 16 Hong Kong and 11 mainland members.