The China Council for International Investment Promotion officially put its Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area liaison office into operation earlier this week in Guangzhou, the provincial capital of Guangdong. 

The office aims to team up with its counterparts in Guangdong to play a more active role in international investment promotions in the area.

A launching ceremony was held during the fifth Guangdong Investment Development Forum and the 2021 annual conference of the Guangdong Investment Promotion Association on Nov 9, which gathered hundreds of attendees including senior executives from Fortune Global 500 companies, listed companies, industrial leaders, financing service providers as well as local investment promotion agencies.

Xue Kaifang (L4), deputy director of the investment promotion agency of Guangdong Provincial Department of Commerce, and Hubert Xu (R1), chairman of the Guangdong Investment Promotion Association, at the opening ceremony of the liaison office on Tuesday. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

Ma Xiuhong, chairman of the China Council for International Investment Promotion and the former vice-minister of commerce, said in her video speech that developing the Greater Bay Area is an unprecedented move worldwide and is China's strategy to establish a new pattern of all-round and high-level opening-up in the new era.

Ma Xiuhong (C), chairman of the China Council for International Investment Promotion and former vice-minister of commerce, delivers a video speech during the opening ceremony. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

Ma pinned high hopes on the new office to forge contacts with all investment promotion platforms in the area, share resources with them and leverage the advantages of the synergic flow of people, capital and information as well as make logistics more effective and convenient to usher in a new Greater Bay Area platform for international investment promotion and cooperation. 

"We will support the liaison office with available resources and we hope that the Guangdong Investment Promotion Association, together with other members in the Greater Bay Area, will join forces to maximize contributions to the region's development," she said.

This year's Guangdong Investment Development Forum and annual conference of the Guangdong Investment Promotion Association witnessed keynote speeches by Liu Yuelun, former chairman of the Guangzhou municipal committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, Zhang Yansheng, secretary-general of the academic committee of the National Development and Reform Commission and chief researcher at the China Center for International Economic Exchanges, and Lin Weixian, honorary chairman of the provincial association, delivered the welcome speech.

Guangdong is a major destination for foreign investment in China and secured about $500 billion worth of foreign capital by the end of 2020, which amounted to one-fifth of the nation's total, and topped other regions across the nation with more than 270,000 foreign funded enterprises, according to official statistics.

Guangdong totally utilized foreign capital worth 99.15 billion yuan ($15.5 billion) in the first half of this year, a year-on-year increase of 20.6 percent, and the province saw 8,280 new foreign-funded enterprises in the first six months this year, which is an increase of 48.3 percent.