Chinanews, Beijing, March 13 – According to the Blue Book on Regional Development in China, the cost of economic development in the Pearl River Delta has been higher and higher, and its environment is not good for its development of an export-oriented economy.

 

The Pearl River Delta used to be the most-developed economic region in China. However, electricity, oil and even workforce scarcities have been haunting it one after another since 2000, not to mention that pollution has long been a headache in the delta.

 

With the appreciation of RMB and China's change of processing trade policies, the low-end enterprises in the delta might not survive future challenges. The new limitations on processing trade products will be a new bottleneck for the Pearl River Delta, which takes up about 40% of China's processing trade. It is estimated that more than 4,000 Hong Kong venture enterprises of the total of 10,000 in the delta will go out of business in the near future.

 

The Pearl River Delta used to be a pacesetter in the beginning of the reform and opening-up, but it is bogged down in a predicament right now. The Yangtze River Delta and Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Area have both been selected as pivot zones in the new state regional economic plan, but not the Pearl River Delta, which ought to warn the latter of the danger of lagging behind.