This article first appeared in Forum, The Edge Malaysia Weekly on 1 December 2025 – 7 December 2025. The content is based on a presentation given at the GBA-Asean Conference on Trade, Finance and Sustainable Development, held on 31 Oct in Hong Kong, and 1 Nov in Shenzhen, 2025.
FOR CENTURIES, the Pearl River delta had been the trading hub for anyone wishing to trade with the Chinese Empire. When one considers the dynamics of China’s political economy over the last millennia, this makes a lot of sense. Not only had the most active foreign traders sailed in from the south, through what we today call the South China Sea, the economic centre of the empire itself had over time shifted century by century southward as well. The political, military and strategic centre had to remain in the north though; this was because invaders had always come from the north and northwest. And on horseback, not in ships.
Today the Greater Bay Area (GBA) is the world’s most dynamic economic district, and it has been recognised as the most innovative region in the world, ahead of the Greater Tokyo Area, and then US’ Silicon Valley.
