Representatives of the Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macau governments travelled to France to jointly promote the commercial and investment advantages of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau Great Bay, the Macau Trade and Investment Promotion Institute (IPIM) said.

The three governments jointly organised a seminar on the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau Great Bay, which took place on 20 June in Paris, France, attended by more than 400 representatives of the government and the business community in the country.

At the meeting, government officials from Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macau encouraged French companies to invest in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau Great Bay region, making use of the commercial advantages of the three territories.

The representative of the Macau Government, Jackson Chang, president of the Macau Trade and Investment Promotion Institute (IPIM), noted that France has always been a major trading partner of Macau, with trade between the two territories, in 2017, totalling about US$720 million.

Chang pointed out that the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau Great Bay involves a model of innovative cooperation, with “one country, two systems, three tariff zones”. and that Macau could, within this framework, enhance the advantages offered by the Chinese overseas community, namely the link between Macau elites and those of Mainland China, the Portuguese-speaking countries, the European Union (EU) and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

In view of the continuous progress of the “Belt and Road” initiative and the start-up of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau bridge, Macau’s business environment continues to improve, providing more development opportunities for Chinese mainland investors and French companies are welcome to take advantage of the Macau platform to expand their business, said the president of IPIM.

IPIM said in a statement that it had received several requests from French companies for investment in Macau, particularly with regard to the Sino-Lusophone platform, the conventions and exhibitions sector and the Macau business environment.

The seminar on the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau Great Bay, in addition to boosting the intention of French companies to invest in Macau, also contributed to improving economic and trade cooperation between the Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macau governments, the statement said. (macauhub)