When Xia Baolong, director of the Hong Kong and Macao Work Office of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and the Hong Kong and Macao Affairs Office of the State Council, set foot in Hong Kong on Tuesday, the symbolism was not hard to miss. During his two-day stay, he will be checking on the progress of the Northern Metropolis. The visit kicked off just a day after the launch of a two-month public consultation on Hong Kong’s first five-year plan, which aims to integrate the special administrative region into the broader national development.
To the skeptics, the very phrase “five-year plan” conjures unease, as if the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region were about to trade its famously freewheeling markets for central command. Yet that anxiety, however understandable, mistakes the nature of what is being proposed. A plan is not a cage. It is a compass. And after years of drift, Hong Kong would do well to decide in which direction it is pointing.
Consider first what the SAR government itself has been at pains to clarify. In response to the question of whether Hong Kong is moving toward a planned economy, Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Janice Tse Siu-wa said the government remains committed to the “one country, two systems” principle that ensures the continuation of Hong Kong’s free market, adding that aligning with the national plan does not mean replacing the free market, but clearly shapes the vision and deployment through macropolicies. This is not semantic hairsplitting. The blueprint and its alignment with the country’s five-year plan will not replace Hong Kong’s free market economy; instead, it will establish a clear strategic plan and vision for the market to develop in a more stable and transparent manner. Capital, after all, craves certainty. A government willing to state plainly where it intends to build, what it intends to nurture, and how it intends to connect with the Chinese mainland gives investors precisely the predictability they have long demanded.
Indeed, the deeper logic here is one of complementarity rather than substitution. The five-year plan, policy addresses and budgets will complement one another, with the government organically integrating all three. Where critics see a straitjacket, the wiser reading is coordination. For too long, the annual budgets and policy addresses have been treated as isolated exercises, lurching from one fiscal year to the next without a unifying thread. A medium-term blueprint stitches these together, ensuring that yearly decisions serve a coherent, longer arc.
The city’s common law tradition, freely convertible currency, and deep and trusted capital markets all remain its comparative advantages, and no plan worth its name would dilute them. ... By better aligning with and serving the nation’s development, Hong Kong can serve as a bridge that connects the mainland and global markets, enabling the public to share more of the benefits
Nowhere is the case for such discipline clearer than in the Northern Metropolis. This is no modest undertaking. The project is an ambitious HK$224 billion ($28.6 billion) infrastructure plan to develop 30,000 hectares of land — around a third of Hong Kong’s territory — along the Shenzhen border. The promise is correspondingly vast. Authorities have said the development will create 650,000 jobs and help tackle the city’s housing crisis by providing accommodation for 2.5 million people. A project of that magnitude, stretching across multiple political cycles, simply cannot be left to the improvisation of annual budgeting. It demands exactly the kind of strategic continuity a five-year plan provides.
And here lies the answer to those who fret that grand visions in Hong Kong too often remain just that — visions. The Northern Metropolis is already moving from rhetoric to reality. Progress now includes the establishment of Hung Shui Kiu Industry Park Co Ltd, the tendering for pilot large-scale land disposal sites within the Hung Shui Kiu/Ha Tsuen New Development Area, and ongoing work to formulate dedicated legislation. Market confidence is following. The MTR Corp received eight bids for a development at one of the project’s critical hubs, far exceeding expectations and providing a strong indication of developers’ interest. Far from being deterred by government planning, private capital is leaning in.
The crown jewel, however, is the cross-border technology platform — the Hetao Shenzhen-Hong Kong Science and Technology Innovation Cooperation Zone. This is where the abstract idea of integration becomes tangible. The Hong Kong Park of the Cooperation Zone has been officially opened, with the remaining buildings of the first batch to be completed progressively starting from 2027. Its early traction is striking. Two wet-laboratory buildings have already attracted over 60 enterprises from the mainland, Hong Kong, and overseas. What makes this experiment historic is its singular character: It is a major national-level cooperation zone that uniquely spans across two distinct social, economic, and judicial systems, with a dedicated focus on science and technology innovation. Here, the “one country, two systems” framework is not a constraint to be managed but an asset to be leveraged.
Crucially, all of this dovetails with national priorities rather than diverging from them. The 15th Five-Year Plan (2026-30) explicitly supports Hong Kong in accelerating the Northern Metropolis development. When the local blueprint aligns with the nation’s, it is not subordination; it is the prudent positioning of a small, open economy alongside the most dynamic growth engine on Earth. Hong Kong’s first five-year plan is being formulated with the Northern Metropolis as a key chapter, transforming a border that was once a dividing line into a genuine gateway.
None of this requires us to surrender what has always made Hong Kong exceptional. The city’s common law tradition, freely convertible currency, and deep and trusted capital markets all remain its comparative advantages, and no plan worth its name would dilute them. On the contrary, the city’s role is to be the indispensable connector. By better aligning with and serving the nation’s development, Hong Kong can serve as a bridge that connects the mainland and global markets, enabling the public to share more of the benefits.
The ongoing public consultation is therefore an invitation, not a directive. The government will hold consultation sessions over the next two months to gather views, with the public able to submit views on a thematic website or by email until Aug 14. Hong Kong residents should seize this unique opportunity. A compass, after all, only works if those holding it agree on where they wish to go. The destination has rarely been clearer.
The author is the convener at China Retold, a member of the Legislative Council, and a member of the Central Committee of the New People’s Party.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.
