The twin cities' "one-hour metropolitan area" accelerated its formation

■ Shenzhen Special Economic Zone Daily reporter Cao Song

On the shores of Shenzhen Bay, the tides are undulating, the night is charming, and the Hong Kong high-rise buildings on the opposite bank are full of bright lights. The cross-border bridge connecting the two places is constantly flowing with vehicles, and the two cities are increasingly closely linked.

Three years ago, General Secretary Xi Jinping inspected Guangdong and chose Shenzhen Qianhai as the first stop, declaring to the world China's determination and will to continue to promote reform and opening up, and making important instructions for the development of Qianhai, asking Qianhai to create new experiences for the country's reform and opening up. After three years of efforts, the construction of various fields in Qianhai has shown a vigorous momentum.

With water in one garment and common development, the cooperation between Shenzhen and Hong Kong has a long history. In the past, the Shenzhen-Hong Kong Cooperation Zone was the focus of the shenzhen-Hong Kong cooperation zone, and the two places continued to expand from many fields such as exchange mechanisms, infrastructure docking, scientific and technological cooperation, economic development, and people's livelihood integration, and the "one-hour metropolitan circle" between the two cities is accelerating. Today, under the construction goal of the "Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area", The cooperation between Shenzhen and Hong Kong has been promoted to a higher level, and a new stage of comprehensive integration and development has begun.

Institutional mechanism: smooth communication, frequent mutual visits

In the new era, Shenzhen-Hong Kong cooperation has risen from a regional development measure to a national strategy. At a new starting point, the communication between the high-level governments of the two places has shown an unprecedented frequency.

On November 9, the 2015 annual meeting of the Qianhai Shekou Free Trade Zone and the Qianhai Shenzhen-Hong Kong Cooperation Zone Advisory Committee was held, and a number of senior hong Kong political and business leaders represented by Hong Kong's Chief Secretary for Administration Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor attended the meeting to discuss the cooperation model and path between Qianhai and Hong Kong in the new era. On November 7, Hong Kong Finance Minister Tsang Chun-wah led major Hong Kong consortiums to visit Qianhai to conduct in-depth exchanges to strengthen industrial cooperation between Shenzhen and Hong Kong. On October 12, Zhang Xiaoming, Director of the Liaison Office of the Central Government in Hong Kong, led about 50 Leaders of Hong Kong Associations to visit Shenzhen, saying that the two places should go hand in hand, develop hand in hand, and jointly face the international community and expand the development space.

Looking back at the middle of the year, on May 8, Ma Xingrui, deputy secretary of the provincial party committee and secretary of the Shenzhen Municipal Party Committee, led a team to visit Hong Kong; on July 10, Leung Chun-ying, chief executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, and his party visited Shenzhen to exchange views on further strengthening all-round cooperation between Shenzhen, Hong Kong and Macao and promoting the construction of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area.

In the promotion of these exchanges and cooperation, a cooperation system between the two places, which is composed of regular exchange visits by high-level government officials, regular docking of special teams, and cooperation driven by key projects, is constantly upgrading. Since 2013, Shenzhen and Hong Kong have established a hotline liaison mechanism between the Mayor of Shenzhen and the Chief Secretary for Administration of the HKSAR Government to communicate and coordinate on some major and urgent issues at any time. Since 2010, municipal leaders have visited Hong Kong 55 times, received more than 90 batches of important delegations from Hong Kong and Macao through the Municipal Hong Kong and Macao Office, and carried out important exchanges and cooperation in Hong Kong and Macao more than 60 times.

In addition, the Shenzhen-Hong Kong government has also established a Guangdong-Hong Kong border liaison mechanism, which has played an important role in emergency rescue and disaster relief in the Shenzhen-Hong Kong border area, safe and orderly customs clearance at ports, and combating cross-border crimes, as well as a number of special groups for the development of the Shenzhen-Hong Kong border area, the governance of the Shenzhen River, the western rail transit, and the development of qianhai. At the same time, the relevant government departments of Shenzhen Municipality have also established an interdepartmental work communication and exchange mechanism with the corresponding departments of the Hong Kong and Macao SAR Governments, regularly communicating closely on relevant cooperation matters and promoting the smooth development of key cooperation projects.

The multi-level, fully functional and effectively operated intergovernmental cooperation mechanism has ensured smooth information and powerful interaction between the two places, and has enabled Shenzhen-Hong Kong cooperation to continuously leap to a new level. According to incomplete statistics, the official and non-governmental exchanges between Qianhai and Hong Kong were reported by the media more than 80 times in 2015, and the content of their mutual visits and exchanges covered political and economic, cultural, regional governance, entrepreneurship and innovation, people's livelihood services and other aspects.

Focus on Qianhai: deep integration, Hong Kong enterprises gathered

As the focus of cooperation between the two places, the Qianhai Shenzhen-Hong Kong Modern Service Industry Cooperation Zone, which superimposes the advantages of the free trade zone, has continuously improved its infrastructure, continuously implemented preferential policies, and increasingly internationalized the business environment and the rule of law, providing a better carrier foundation for cooperation between Shenzhen and Hong Kong.

In order to strengthen cooperation with Hong Kong, Qianhai has provided Real policy space and industrial space for Hong Kong people and Hong Kong enterprises in terms of land transfer, tax incentives for Hong Kong enterprises, and talent exchange and cooperation. At present, of the 17 plots of land that Have been transferred in Qianhai, 9 pieces of land are bid by Hong Kong listed enterprises or enterprises with actual controllers registered in Hong Kong; more than 10 types of talents such as Hong Kong certified tax agents, accountants, housing managers and social workers can practice in Qianhai.

In terms of financial innovation, as of the end of September 2015, the cumulative withdrawal amount of Qianhai cross-border RMB loans reached 31.47 billion yuan, enterprises in the region issued RMB bonds to Hong Kong of 1 billion yuan, the actual cross-border inflow of funds from the QFLP pilot was 678 million US dollars, and the QDIE pilot had used a quota of US$961 million, which greatly consolidated Hong Kong's position as an offshore RMB center and explored a new path for the return of Hong Kong's offshore RMB.

In terms of the construction of the rule of law, the Qianhai Court was officially listed, a number of measures set a precedent in the country, and pioneered the Hong Kong juror system, selecting Hong Kong mediators to conduct commercial mediation. At present, the only Research Center for The Clarification of Chinese, Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan and Foreign Laws, the Supreme People's Court's Research Base for Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan and Foreign Laws, and the Supreme People's Court's Research Base for Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan and Foreign Law Clarification and Research, "one center and two bases" have also settled in Qianhai to provide legal support for enterprises to "please come in" and "go out".

In terms of innovation and entrepreneurship, Qianhai Shenzhen-Hong Kong Youth DreamWorks aims to provide development space for Shenzhen and Hong Kong youth in its first year of opening with "dazzling": as of December 1, DreamWorks has settled a total of 115 entrepreneurial teams, including 52 international teams from Hong Kong and Macao. The Hong Kong team can not only apply for special subsidy funds of up to 2 million yuan, but also obtain support from top incubators, angel investors and other entrepreneurial element resource institutions in financing, legal affairs and marketing.

The continuous improvement of the software and hardware environment has stimulated the enthusiasm of Hong Kong people and Hong Kong enterprises to participate in the development and construction of Qianhai. The number of Hong Kong-funded enterprises in the Qianhai Cooperation Zone surged from 246 at the end of 2013 to 2,743 at the end of November this year, achieving more than 10 times growth, with a total registered capital of 309.323 billion yuan.

"Shenzhen-Hong Kong cooperation is the core competitiveness of the development of Qianhai Shekou Free Trade Zone." Tian Fu, member of the Standing Committee of the Shenzhen Municipal Party Committee and director of the Management Committee of Qianhai Shekou Free Trade Area, said that in the next step, the Qianhai Shekou Free Trade Area should further cancel or relax the access restrictions for Hong Kong and Macao investors, and the construction of the free trade new city will also accelerate the construction of Hong Kong's advantageous characteristic industrial bases, promote the settlement of more than 2,500 Hong Kong enterprises within the year, form 3 Hong Kong-funded modern service industry clusters, and give full play to the role of the Qianhai Shekou Free Trade Area in promoting Hong Kong's prosperity and stability.

According to the "Qianhai Shenzhen-Hong Kong Modern Service Industry Cooperation Zone to Promote Shenzhen-Hong Kong Cooperation Work Plan", Qianhai will achieve the development goal of "10,000 million and 100" in 2020, that is, the construction area developed and used by Hong Kong-funded and Hong Kong enterprises will exceed 9 million square meters, the scale of Hong Kong-funded service industry will exceed 100 billion yuan, more than 100 Hong Kong-funded innovation and entrepreneurship leading enterprises will be successfully incubated and cultivated, and ten major agglomeration bases for Hong Kong's advantageous industries will be built.

Economy, trade and people's livelihood: jointly build a win-win situation, with remarkable results

As the government level enters the "honeymoon period", Qianhai and other key cooperation areas have steadily advanced, the economic and trade, people's livelihood, culture and other exchange activities between Shenzhen and Hong Kong have heated up rapidly, and the cooperation in the fields of finance, scientific and technological innovation, medical education and other fields has achieved remarkable results.

In the environment of slow economic recovery in Europe and the United States and declining domestic economic growth, economic and trade cooperation between Shenzhen and Hong Kong has still maintained rapid growth. In 2014, Shenzhen's total import and export to Hong Kong trade totaled US$145.01 billion, of which US$143.32 billion was exported and US$1.70 billion was imported. Hong Kong companies invested 1,966 projects in Shenzhen, with a contract investment of US$9.59 billion.

Since the signing of the "Shenzhen-Hong Kong Innovation Circle" Cooperation Agreement in 2007, the governments of Shenzhen and Hong Kong have jointly funded the successful development of scientific research cooperation projects between the two places. As of 2014, the two places have jointly funded a total of 57 Shenzhen-Hong Kong innovation circle cooperation projects, and Shenzhen has unilaterally funded 227 cooperation projects, with a total investment of 350 million yuan. Six Hong Kong universities have begun to take shape in the construction of deep-industry, education and research bases, with 54 scientific research institutions and 13 registered enterprises, with a registered capital of about HK$290 million, and have undertaken 473 national, provincial and municipal projects, obtained support funds of 610 million yuan, and cultivated more than 6,800 talents of various types.

The promotion of cross-border infrastructure construction and port customs clearance facilitation between the two places has also yielded fruitful results, with the Construction of the Hong Kong-Shenzhen Western Expressway Project being stepped up, the smooth governance of the Shenzhen River, and the construction of the Liantang/Xiangyuanwei Port.

In the field of social and people's livelihood, in 2014, with the first official enrollment of the University of Chinese in Hong Kong (Shenzhen), the total number of sister schools in the two places reached 318, the number of Hong Kong students for children reached 900, and 7 schools opened "Hong Kong student classes". The number of medical services provided by HKU Shenzhen Hospital, which opened in July 2012, has grown steadily, and there are currently 6 Hong Kong-funded medical institutions operating in Shenzhen.

You have me, I have you, and in the new era, Shenzhen and Hong Kong have ushered in a new opportunity for historical development.

On March 28 this year, the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Commerce jointly issued the "Vision and Actions for Jointly Building the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road", which for the first time clearly pointed out that the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area should be built, and the future development between Shenzhen and Hong Kong has been given a more magnificent imagination space. Learning from each other's strong points, developing a win-win situation, and working together towards the international top city cluster, Shenzhen-Hong Kong cooperation has a long way to go and unlimited scenery.