GBA posts nearly USD2 trillion in economic output in 2023

Indicators & trends

The total economic output of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA) exceeded 14 trillion yuan (about USD1.97 trillion) in 2023, achieving one ninth of China’s total with less than 0.6% of the national territorial area, local authorities have revealed.

Zhu Wei, executive deputy director of the GBA office in Guangdong, said the total economic output of the GBA was 10.8 trillion yuan in 2018, and the past five years witnessed an increase of 3.2 trillion yuan.

Meanwhile, the GBA has seen an improved scientific and technological innovation capacity, transportation network, more facilitating platforms and a better business environment, Zhu said.

Maggie Xiaoqing Fu, a professor at the University of Macau, said China’s economic landscape is displaying a stable and diversified trend, with positive prospects for the around 5% GDP growth target announced during the “two sessions.”

The ongoing supply-side structural reforms are pivotal in optimizing the economic structure, the professor in finance and business economics said, adding that an increasing proportion of service and high-tech industries can inject new momentum into economic growth.

She said in an interview at the Boao Forum for Asia Annual Conference 2024 that China has the advantage of concentrating efforts to accomplish major tasks. “It can not only adjust across cycles but also counter-cyclically regulate its economy.”

Fu also explained how the “new quality productive forces,” a new concept in China’s development, is poised to accelerate growth across the region.

“By harnessing new technologies, industries, and formats, the Chinese economy can accelerate industrial upgrading, enhance innovation capabilities, and promote regional economic integration,” she said, noting that it will also create a more open, inclusive, and beneficial economic pattern in the Asian region.