Catalog

Broadening the Benefits
ADB Review [ April-May 2006 ]

Including the PRC’s Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region is a natural fit in the Greater Mekong Subregion Program

By Ronald Antonio Q. Butiong, (rabutiong@adb.org)
Programs Economist, Mekong Department

OPEN CORRIDORSThe Li river near Guilin is one of Guangxi’s famous tourism attractions (top); the Nanning–Youyiguan expressway near the PRC–Viet Nam border (below)

The 13th GMS Ministerial Conference held in Vientiane, Lao People’s Democratic Republic (Lao PDR) in December 2004 agreed to include Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region (Guangxi) of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) Program. With a total land area of 236,700 square kilometers bordering the PRC’s Guangdong, Hunan, Guizhou, and Yunnan provinces and Viet Nam, Guangxi is one of two provinces in the PRC that share borders with other GMS countries. Like Yunnan province, Guangxi has strong linkages with the GMS in, among other things, resources, culture, trade, transport, and tourism.

Guangxi’s participation in the GMS Program is seen as a natural northward extension of the GMS’ geography—a clear outcome of strengthening economic relations between the PRC and other GMS countries. The value of total trade between Guangxi and other GMS countries expanded from $327 million in 2001 to $822 million in 2004, or about 20% of Guangxi’s total foreign trade. Cross-border tourism is flourishing, with an estimated 2 million tourists crossing the PRC (Guangxi)–Viet Nam border in 2004. In recent years, Guangxi and its immediate GMS neighbor, Viet Nam, have entered into contracts on joint natural resource development and manufacturing. The prime ministers of the two countries have also agreed to embark on the “Two Corridors and One Belt” initiative involving Yunnan province and Guangxi in the PRC, and the northern part of Viet Nam. Technological and cultural exchange programs between the PRC and other GMS countries have also accelerated in recent years, including at the annual PRC–ASEAN Expo, which is regularly held in Guangxi’s capital city of Nanning.

PRC EXPORTS arrive in Viet Nam through the border crossing between Dongxing in Guangxi and Mong Cai in northern Viet Nam

A study that the Asian Development Bank (ADB) conducted in November 1995 concluded that the closer integration of Guangxi into the GMS will be a “win-win” situation for both the PRC and other GMS countries. On the one hand, this would foster even closer economic relations between the PRC and other GMS countries, and support the establishment of the PRC– ASEAN Free Trade Area. Guangxi’s closer integration would enhance the overall attractiveness of the GMS as a large and growing market, as an appealing investment and tourist destination. It would also allow other GMS countries to strengthen their linkages with and capitalize on the wealth of opportunities offered by the relatively prosperous coastal provinces of the PRC.

Officials of the PRC government, Guangxi authorities, and an ADB team led by Toru Shibuichi, Country Director of ADB’s Resident Mission in the PRC, discussed the study at a workshop held in Nanning on 21 November 2005. Key projects in transport, urban development, health, tourism, and private sector development— which would accelerate Guangxi’s closer integration in the GMS— were discussed at the workshop.

ADB-assisted projects in Guangxi— Nanning–Youyiguan and Nanning–Baise expressways, and the rehabilitation of Fangcheng Port—have clear regional dimensions, thus facilitating closer integration of Guangxi in the GMS.

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