Fujian teams up with Macao to jointly build the Belt and Road Initiative, aiming to make it a key engine to fuel economic growth for the two sides. [Photo/VCG]

East China's Fujian province will further strengthen cooperation with Macao to jointly build the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), aiming to make it a key engine to fuel economic growth for the two sides.

Fujian was selected as a core area of the Maritime Silk Road in 2015, and Macao is a key element in the maritime part of the BRI. The two places are good neighbors, enjoying geographical proximity, while their residents also have close ties and similar customs. There are more than 100,000 Fujian people living in Macao, accounting for about 20 percent of its total population.

The two places started their cooperation as early as 1999, with a number of cooperative agreements signed over the past 20 years.

Official statistics show that by September 2019, the utilization of Macao investment in Fujian totaled $1.8 billion, and about 40,000 people are currently working in Macao.

Both sides also have achieved remarkable progress in youth exchanges, cultural communication, and investment trade, according to Huang Maoxing, dean of Fujian Normal University's School of Economics.

Industrial integration is a major highlight of the two side's cooperation. For example, Macao Newland Technology Company was built by Fujian-based Newland Communications Science and Technology in 2015, and has actively participated in the development of Macao's diversification in many fields like smart city management and environmental technology.

Huang added that Fujian should make full use of the existing cooperative mechanisms with Macao, as well as explore deep cooperation in the fields of digital technology, the Internet of Things (IoT), big data, and blockchain with the aim of promoting the innovation capacity of both sides.

Zhang Zongzhen, president of the Macao Association for Chinese culture development and promotion, said that Fujian and Macao can complement each other's advantages in economy and trade, conventions and exhibitions, tourism, environmental protection, as well as featured agriculture to seek the high-quality development of the BRI.

Macao maintains close ties with Portuguese-speaking countries, and through these ties, Fujian has teamed with Macao to explore business opportunities in countries and regions along the Belt and Road routes.

In the future, Fujian will take an active part in exhibitions, as well as business and trade meetings held in Macao, enabling it to establish close ties with Portuguese-speaking countries to promote its characteristic products like clocks and watches from Zhangzhou, ceramics from Dehua, as well as electric machines from Fuan, spreading Fujian products around the world.