Late last year, the State Council approved the establishment of Guangdong Free Trade Zone (FTZ), including Nansha New District in Guangzhou, Qianhai New District in Shenzhen and Hengqin New District in Zhuhai. Focusing on the integration and cooperation with Hong Kong and Macao, the three areas have aroused widespread attention.

"The establishment of the Free Trade Zones in Guangdong will benefit Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macao," said Xu Shaoshi, director of the National Development and Reform Commission on March 5, 2015.

Presently the three areas are exploring and trying new financial reform, which is an important step for the FTZ. "Although the financial reform faces lots of difficulties, the central government has made up its mind," noted Ma Weihua, member of the national committee of CPPCC and president of Wing Lung Bank in Hong Kong.

"For one thing, the external environment isn't very good. There have been more great changes in global trade and competition. More importantly, developed countries are preparing or upgrading the existing cooperation organizations and trade agreement organizations to rewrite the rules of global trade. For another, countries themselves give less impetus to development nowadays. The labor supply has declined in absolute number and the demographic dividend has shrunk. Trade reversal, the decline of savings dividends, resource constraints and comparatively slow technology development will all make our country less competitive in the future," said Ma.

Ma also believes that the development of the FTZ is partly based on the internationalization of the RMB. As a national strategy, the internationalization of the RMB should be accelerated and promoted. In this process, actively encouraging foreign companies to use the RMB as a clearance currency will depend on prudent risk management and control and the RMB reflux mechanism. Furthermore, the FTZ is also setting an exemplary role for China's financial industry reform. This will greatly promote the introduction and effusion of capital and optimize the investment structure of China's capital market.

During the CPPCC session, Ma also proposed that Shenzhen-Hong Kong Stock Connect program should be put into practice as soon as possible. This policy affects the internationalization process of the mainland capital market in some ways. The program will help the mainland stock market attract more foreign investment and enhance exchanges between Hong Kong, Shanghai and Shenzhen stock markets.

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