Celebrators share hopes for the Greater Bay Area

People from the Hong Kong and Macao special administrative regions who joined the New China 70th anniversary celebrations in Guangdong province have expressed their hopes for the Greater Bay Area.

The building of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area and the Belt and Road Initiative present unlimited opportunities for Hong Kong's development, said Yu Kwok-chun, chairman of the Hong Kong Federation of Overseas Chinese Associations.

The HKSAR should play to its advantages and actively integrate into the bigger picture of the country, Yu said.

"By capitalizing on the country's favorable policies, Hong Kong is set to make significant accomplishments in the Greater Bay Area," he said while attending a celebration in Guangzhou on Sunday.

Eric Fok Kai-shan, executive chairman of the Hong Kong Guangdong Youth Association, said he plans to establish bases for entrepreneurial projects in nine Guangdong cities in the Greater Bay Area. Fok also wants a Greater Bay Area elites' alliance established by the end of the year to enhance exchanges among youths on employment and entrepreneurial projects.

"In the past few years, we have held a lot of activities for exchanges in the hope of enabling youths from Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macao to integrate into the building of the Greater Bay Area through culture, sport and some other events," said Fok, who initiated the first session of a Greater Bay Area youth soccer contest last year.

Lisa Lau, secretary of a residents' association in Macao, arranged an event there to watch the live broadcast of the grand parade in Beijing on Tuesday morning. She then traveled to neighboring Zhuhai city in Guangdong for the fireworks show.

She said Macao is a very small place and the Greater Bay Area has created abundant business opportunities for the special administrative region to build itself into a high-quality tourist destination.

Macao's elderly care and healthcare should also be extended to other parts of the Greater Bay Area, where more and more Macao residents have chosen to live. Lau's association started such work last year, and it has been well received by local residents, she said.

John Kam Hou-yin, a senior partner at Shenzhen Deepchain Technology Co, said he was excited to see the fireworks display in Shenzhen on Tuesday evening.

He said he was grateful he could celebrate with his countrymen in a city close to his hometown and hopes Hong Kong, which has been undergoing months of unrest, can restore order soon.

Kam, who grew up in Hong Kong, has been working between the city and Shenzhen.

He started his own firm in Shenzhen in 2017 and admits that as a middle-aged man, he feels stressed about changing jobs. But he firmly believes in the development potential of the region and is confident his startup will be a success.

He believes the future of the Greater Bay Area bodes well for him, especially in the supply chain services for construction projects.