The Chinese “Belt and Road” initiative will provide Macau with many new opportunities for development and economic and trade relations, and will strengthen its role as a major centre for tourism and leisure worldwide, said Jorge Rangel, president of the International Institute of Macau (IIM).

The IIM president said in an interview with Xinhua on the eve of the opening of the “Belt and Road” Forum for International Cooperation that China’s initiative is a major challenge for a world that urgently needs to open up and consolidate new paths and ways for economic and commercial cooperation and cultural, academic and social exchange.

Rangel said that the traditional vocation of Macau as a trading post and its affinities with Portuguese-speaking countries, enshrined by the central government of China by giving the territory the mission of becoming a platform for cooperation between China and those countries, will now be closely linked to the development of the “Belt and Road” initiative.

“At the meeting of the Forum for Economic and Trade Cooperation between China and Portuguese-Speaking Countries held in October 2016, it had already been recommended for the Forum to work together with the development of the ‘Belt and Road’ Initiative, which is a very important contribution that Macau can make,” said the president of IIM.

The Macau branch of the Bank of China, one of Macau’s largest banks, has granted more than 3 billion patacas (US$375 million) in loans since 2016 to support companies doing business in countries and regions along “Belt and Road.” (macauhub)