Macao will strengthen co-operation in Pan-Pearl River Delta Regional tourism: CE

The Chief Executive, Mr Edmund Ho Hau Wah, said today the SAR Government would capitalise on the opportunities created by the listing of Macao’s historic centres as World Cultural Heritage and to strengthen co-operation in Pan-Pearl River Delta Regional tourism. Mr Ho made that pledge when he spoke at the high-ranking Officials Forum session of the second Pan-Pearl River Delta Regional Co-operation and Development Forum, which opened in Chengdu today. He said the Central Government’s support was pivotal in the successful listing by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) and that the Macao SAR Government would contribute even more efforts in protecting and promoting cultural heritage, encouraging the diversification in the tourism industry and promote co-operation in tourism with other members of the Pan-Pearl River Delta Region. He said that Pan-Pearl River Delta Regional Cooperation had entered a more practical stage, having achieved real progress and having laid a sound foundation for future developments. The “One Country Two Systems” principle made Macao SAR’s foundation and its privilege, with the implementation of Pan-Pearl River Delta Regional Co-operation, Macao is now exposed to new opportunities which are fully in line with the SAR Government’s policy of forging a business service platform and enhancing Macao’s industry structure, Mr Ho said. “In the co-operation other members of the Pan-Pearl River Region, The SAR Government’s priority is to provide good service and to perform our mediating role to the best.” Mr Ho said He said the overall development of the Pan-Pearl River Delta would in turn promote the social and economic growth of Macao. Mr Ho also spoke of his recent visit to Brazil where the country’s President had pledged to use Macao as the gateway for Brazilian enterprises to enter the China market. This demonstrated Macao’s mediating role between China and Portuguese-speaking countries -- which the SAR Government would continue to consolidate -- was even more widely recognised. Furthermore, he said, the joint promotion with Guangdong Province in Portugal last year brought valuable experience to both Macao and Guangdong in the joint promotion of commercial relations. Mr Ho said that the Macao SAR Government, since its founding, had maximised all efforts to build a fair, open and orderly market and recently, the SAR Government even further lowered the tax rate to make it an even more attractive commercial service platform. Mr Ho said that co-operation, pragmatism and complementation were the dynamics of Pan-Pearl River Delta. He pledged that the SAR Government would continue to contribute to this relation and believed that it would deepen in every aspect.