|
BEIJING, Feb. 21-- Chinese authorities have unveiled the outline development plan for the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, aiming to build it into a role model of high-quality development, an international first-class bay area and a world-class city cluster. The bay area consists of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, the Macao Special Administrative Region and nine cities in Guangdong Province, with a combined population of about 70 million at the end of 2017 and a gross domestic product of about 10 trillion yuan (1.48 trillion U.S. dollars) in 2017. The plan, released on Monday, covers the period from now to 2022 in the immediate term and extends to 2035 in the long term. Promoting the development of the Greater Bay Area is a major decision made by the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at the core. With his broad vision and profound wisdom, President Xi, also general secretary of the CPC Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, has planned the bay area's development. The following is a timeline of some key moments of Xi's involvement in pushing forward the project. -- In December 2017, Xi visited Guangdong in his first inspection trip outside Beijing after the 18th CPC National Congress. He expressed the hope for Guangdong to partner with Hong Kong and Macao to create a more competitive world-class city cluster. | 
