General Secretary Hu Jintao emphasized in his political report to the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC): "We must both adhere to the one-China principle and respect the differences in the two systems, both uphold the power of the central government and ensure a high degree of autonomy in the special administrative regions. Both give play to the mainland's staunch support of Hong Kong and Macao and serve to increase their competitiveness. At no time should we focus only on one side to the neglect of the other."

My understanding of this paragraph is that it points the direction for Hong Kong to find its place and role in national development in the 10 years following the 18th CPC congress. Therefore some things will change and some will not.

I believe one of the things that will not change is the win-win relationship between Hong Kong and the mainland because it has proved beneficial to both sides in the past 30 years or so. Hong Kong demonstrated the real worth of maintaining an inter-complementary and mutually-beneficial relationship with the mainland through joint development, and its significance to the mainland's development as an international center for finance, trade, logistics and other modern services.

On the other hand, some changes are necessary to give Hong Kong a bigger role in national development and boost its own growth along the way. The changes are:

1. Stepping up "passing Hong Kong's knowledge to the mainland". Hong Kong's social system and economic structure are fully adapted to international commerce, with full freedom for goods, capital, talent and information flows. These factors are the reasons that the city has been on top of the world in terms of business environment. Hong Kong's experience in this respect can help the mainland improve its market system, industry standards and its social and urban management systems.

2. Strengthening its role as a bridge linking the mainland and the outside world. Hong Kong should make full use of the Closer Economic Partnership Arrangement (CEPA) to attract foreign businesses to set up regional headquarters or subsidiaries here, for easier access to the mainland market. Meanwhile, Hong Kong can also serve as an experimental platform for mainland brand names to help themselves enter overseas markets.

3. Expanding the scope of cooperation with the mainland. Hong Kong can and should increase its cooperative effort by helping the mainland develop modern services industries, emerging industries, as well as regional and key infrastructure development projects. The city should expand and enrich CEPA while capitalizing on its highly-internationalized character to help the mainland gain experience in opening financial markets by using Hong Kong as a test range.

4. Increasing Hong Kong's strength as an "engine" for regional cooperation and development. Hong Kong is an important driving force behind regional cooperation and development in the Pearl River Delta (PRD) region and can power the neighboring region to exert greater influence on areas further upstream, and even the rest of the mainland.

5. Building a personnel training base. Hong Kong has been an excellent training camp for mainland talents over the years and can do even better in this regard by further developing its educational facilities, which will allow the SAR to train more talents to meet rising demands from the mainland and especially the PRD region.

In my opinion, the things that will change and those that won't all contain "positive energy" necessary for Hong Kong to weather the current economic crises, boost the combined strength of Hong Kong-mainland cooperation to meet global competition and help the mainland reach the goal to "complete building of a moderately prosperous society by 2020." They will elevate Hong Kong's place and role in the post-18th CPC congress national development to a whole new level.

The author is a HK member of the CPPCC.

(HK Edition 11/17/2012 page3)