Jan 24-29,1984: Deng Xiaoping visits Shenzhen and Zhuhai

Jan 24-29, 1984: Deng Xiaoping visits Shenzhen and Zhuhai

On Jan 24-29, 1984, Deng Xiaoping visited two special economic zones: Shenzhen and Zhuhai. On Feb 7-10, 1984, he inspected Xiamen and its special economic zone while it was under construction.

During the visit, Deng Xiaoping wrote in his inscription for the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone, "Shenzhen's development and experience prove that the policy of establishing special economic zones is correct."

His inscription for Zhuhai was: "The Zhuhai Special Economic Zone is good."

He also provided an inscription for Xiamen as "developing the Special Economic Zone in a better and faster way."

On Feb 24, Deng discussed with officials of the central government in Beijing on how to run the economic zones well and how to increase the number of "opening-up" cities.

"Our guiding ideology of establishing special economic zones and implementing opening-up policy is not to close some, but to open more. The special economic zones are the windows of technology, management, knowledge, and foreign policy. In addition to the existing special economic zones, we might consider opening up several port cities such as Dalian and Qingdao. We also plan to develop Hainan Island," he said. "Let parts of China get richer first; egalitarianism is not going to work."