In 1979, Deng Xiaoping drew a circle along the South China Sea and established a coastal special economic zone.
Today, 44 years later, five more "circles" will be drawn in Guangdong, and a metropolitan area or urban agglomeration that is one level larger than the first-tier cities is coming.
On December 20, the Guangdong government released a development plan for five metropolitan areas. So far, there are 12 "national" metropolitan areas in the mainland.
The new approvals have just been received for the metropolitan areas of Guangzhou and Shenzhen, which are located in Guangdong Province. In the future, with the further construction and strengthening of the metropolitan area, the concept of a larger urban agglomeration will also make many people become people in the metropolitan area.
Below, let's take a look at what the distribution and planning of these different metropolitan areas are.
Guangdong's 5 "Circles"
On the 20th, with the release of information from the Guangdong Provincial Government, the planning and introduction of the new metropolitan area appeared again. First of all, it must be the metropolitan area around the provincial capital Guangzhou.
According to the scope of the plan, the core areas of the future Guangzhou metropolitan area are the two cities of Guangzhou and Foshan. For many years, there have been calls for the merger of the same city in Guangzhou-Foshan, and now with the planning of the Guangzhou metropolitan area, not only the future planning of the merger has become a reality, but also this scope is not limited to the two cities.
Guangzhou and Foshan are the core areas, and there are other areas on the periphery. Specifically, it is located in the four regions of Duanzhou, Dinghu, Gaoyao and Sihui in Zhaoqing, and the three areas of Qingcheng, Qingqing and Fogang in Qingyuan.
In other words, some counties and cities on the periphery of Guangzhou are also included in the future Guangzhou metropolitan area. The combined area of the entire region is about 20,000 square kilometers, and according to 2022 data, the population of the region has reached 32.57 million.
With such a large scope and population density, the scale of the industry is concentrated, and the output value of GDP is around 5 trillion. In the future, with the merger and construction of metropolitan areas, the development of equipment manufacturing, biopharmaceutical, automobile, tourism, agriculture and other fields will play a linkage effect.
Looking at the whole of Guangdong Province, in addition to the Guangzhou metropolitan area, there are four other metropolitan areas under planning.
The second Shenzhen metropolitan area, with Shenzhen as the core, includes Dongguan and Huizhou, plus parts of Heyuan and Shanwei. This area covers an area of about 16,000 square kilometers, involving a population of 34.15 million, and a GDP output value of around 4.9 trillion yuan.
According to the plan, the Shenzhen metropolitan area is the core area of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, and the high-quality development in the future will face the world and play a great role in radiating and driving.
The third is the metropolitan area with Zhuhai as the core area on the west bank of the Pearl River Estuary, including Zhuhai, Zhongshan, Yangjiang and Jiangmen. Its area is 21,000 square kilometers, involving a population of 14.35 million people, and a GDP of about 1.3 trillion yuan.
The above three metropolitan areas basically revolve around the Pearl River Delta. From the perspective of the whole Guangdong Province, there are two metropolitan areas in the east and west wings.
To the west is the Zhanmao metropolitan area, located in western Guangdong, including Zhanjiang and Maoming, two prefecture-level cities, with an area of more than 24,000 square kilometers, involving a population of 13.27 million and a GDP of 761.3 billion yuan.
The Zhanmao metropolitan area, which coincides with the planned Beibu Gulf urban agglomeration, is an important component of each other, and in the future, this area will become a hub for the development of sea and land in the western part of China.
Located in the eastern part of Guangdong Province, it is the Shantou Chaojie metropolitan area, which includes the three regions of Shantou, Chaozhou and Jieyang, as well as the Meizhou metropolitan area. This area covers an area of about 10,600 square kilometers, involving a population of 13.75 million and a GDP of 659.1 billion yuan.
In the future, the development of this region will be connected with the development of the coastal areas of Fujian and Zhejiang, and at the same time, it will radiate and drive the hinterland inland areas of Guangdong, Fujian and Jiangxi.
The above-mentioned metropolitan areas in Guangdong Province, Guangzhou and Shenzhen, are clearly announced at the national level. Looking at the whole country, the planning and introduction of metropolitan areas in other regions have also been promoted in recent years.
Metropolitan areas in other parts of the country
From the perspective of time, the Nanjing metropolitan area is the first metropolitan area to be officially approved, and in February 2021, the relevant plan has been promulgated.
The metropolitan area is characterized by being trans-provincial and includes parts of Nanjing, Zhenjiang, Yangzhou, Huai'an and Changzhou. Wuhu, Ma'anshan, Chuzhou and Xuancheng in Anhui Province are also in regional planning.
It covers an area of 27,000 square kilometers and has a GDP of 11.3 trillion yuan. It has the largest economy of all the approved national metropolitan areas.
Also in 2021, the state also approved two metropolitan areas, Fuzhou and Chengdu, one in South China, one in Southwest China, and one in East China.
Starting in 2022, the "Circle" mode will be turned on at high speed. In East China, there is the Hangzhou metropolitan area, Zhengzhou, Wuhan and Changzhutan metropolitan areas in China, there is another Chongqing metropolitan area in the southwest region, Xi'an metropolitan area in the northwest region, and Shenyang metropolitan area in the northeast.
In addition to the two metropolitan areas of Guangzhou and Shenzhen, which have just been announced, there are currently 12 metropolitan areas approved by the national level. From the perspective of geographical division, it basically covers all regions in the east, west, north, south and middle.
In terms of the economic scale of different metropolitan areas, Nanjing, Guangzhou and Shenzhen are very large. Located in the west and Chengdu and Chongqing, its total economic volume exceeds the level of two trillion yuan.
In addition, the economic scale of the three metropolitan areas of Fuzhou, Changzhutan and Xi'an has exceeded the trillion level. Different metropolitan areas are located in different regions, and their economic development varies greatly.
At the same time, the degree of coordinated development within each metropolitan area is also different. In some metropolitan areas, the coordinated development of the region has been going on for many years before the planning. In some areas under planning, the relationship needs to be straightened out in the future collaborative development.
For example, the Nanjing metropolitan area, the relevant planning was proposed in the 80s of the last century, and the development of regional collaborative planning in the Yangtze River Delta region for many years has also formed a development trend of inter-provincial cooperation in this region.
From a conceptual point of view, the metropolitan area is not only a geographical concept, but also a concept of coordinated economic development within a region. It can be classified into a circle, not only because the two are next to each other geographically, but also because of the great interconnection and complementarity in economic development.
From the perspective of a country's development, metropolitan areas are the inevitable products of economic development to a certain scale.
Changes perceived by the individual
In the future, a person living in the Guangzhou metropolitan area may live in Foshan, but around work-related industries and interpersonal relationships, it may be in Qingyuan or Sihui City.
Different from the previous working relationship in different places, after belonging to the same metropolitan area, the integration of some industrial chains, the cost of employment and other work-related matters will be reduced correspondingly.
Of course, it also depends on the specific development and industrial planning of each metropolitan area in the next step. What a metropolitan area is, just like the chain of command in the army, the scope and number of people involved will gradually increase from low to high.
Communities form streets, streets form districts and counties, districts and counties combine to form cities, and the integrated development of more than two cities forms a metropolitan area. This is the natural development product of a country's economic volume after reaching a certain level.
Just like the war between the Soviet Union and Germany during World War II, the armies of both sides were more than 3 million, and with such a huge number of troops, when commanding operations, it was necessary to establish a larger group army or even a group army group than the army level to integrate and coordinate actions.
Also in the development of regional planning, a city is equivalent to the concept of the military level, because of the continuous expansion and development of the city, its industrial chain and the surrounding areas are closely integrated.
If the development of each city is still independent at this time, the relevant coordination and promotion of development will be hindered. However, if the integrated development at the city level is carried out, and multiple cities are planned together to form a huge circle and cluster, the trend of integrated development can be accelerated.
For example, in the United States, there are different metropolitan areas on the east and west coasts and in the north and south, which are also called metro areas in concept. Whenever a region is grouped together, its corresponding development will converge and gradually integrate.
For individuals in different cities, as mentioned above, what kind of occupation a person engages in, in the future, the connection and interconnection between a metropolitan area and other cities will become more and more close.
Moreover, from the perspective of different metropolitan areas, when the coordinated development is further developed, the industrial scale in different metropolitan areas will gradually form their own characteristics and trends. Some have developed manufacturing industries, some have high biopharmaceutical technology, and some have financial industries.
Although the development of each city also has such characteristics from the perspective of individual cities, after the emergence of metropolitan areas, the above-mentioned development characteristics will be formed into a larger scale and produce a greater driving effect in the form of clusters.
At that time, the industrial scale within a cluster will be able to achieve perfect development and closure. Individuals in the area, regardless of the related occupations, can find the corresponding points in different categories. From point to area, we can drive economic development to move forward to the in-depth region.
Constant economic and technological evolution
In a mature metropolitan area, the movement of people will be more frequent, and the scale of foreign population attracted and accepted will be larger. This kind of agglomeration development is no longer characterized by a single city, but in the state of clusters and circles, showing a multi-point development trend.
The current urbanization rate of the mainland has reached 63.89%, which means that the development of a single city has reached a certain level, and the next step is to integrate different regions and organically integrate each city for development.
In this way, the trend of population movement will be more obvious, and the agglomeration effect will be presented in a larger area. In the future, in a metropolitan area, some urban areas may have more secondary industries, while others may have more developed tertiary industries.
The characteristics of the two economic structures, complementing each other in the same region, and the synergy between each other, all depend on the degree of population agglomeration. Especially when the population and industry reach a certain scale, the efficiency will be improved, and the cost will run in a more reasonable range.
In the same way, the development of technology will need more people to promote it in the future. The development of the metropolitan area will promote the reshaping of the structure of the city, and the composition of personnel will be relatively more reasonable according to the development of the industry.
Especially in different metropolitan areas, the construction of R&D technology centers will form a greater driving advantage.
If you look at it from a personal point of view, you will see that the development of a region, everything that revolves around the operation of the economy. With the continuous improvement of the scale of the economy, the state of life and humanities will also form their own advantages and characteristics in the characteristics of their respective regions.
Just like some urban clusters in developed countries, some very old cities, the intellectual and technological developments that surround and build on them, have become fertile ground for the continuous development of the region.
Similarly, the continuous construction of our metropolitan area will promote the integrated development of the economy in the short term, and in the long run, the coordinated development of a region will profoundly affect the future people's thinking and even the direction of evolution.
epilogue
The metropolitan area is an ecology, and the key to this ecology is the vitality of people and the characteristics of industry. From the primary industry to the secondary industry and even the tertiary industry, the development of different categories, the docking of various subordinate relationships, and the driving of the core area to the surrounding areas, etc., are all an organic whole.
Therefore, building a metropolitan area is like creating a composite organic lifeform. It's bigger, it's more complex, but the synergy and consistency will keep it moving in step in the future.
The people who live in the circle are the key driving force that moves the whole organism forward.
Resources:
"The Development Plan of Guangdong's Five Major Metropolitan Areas Has Been Introduced, and Coordinating Regional Development Has Become the Focus" Yicai, December 21, 2023
"Who is the strongest in the 6 major national metropolitan areas?", Yicai, August 26, 2022