16 2.2 Comparison with Other Cities in the Greater Bay Area 2.2.1 Selected cities and reasons for the selection: In the past ten years, the Greater Bay Area (GBA) has developed into a world-class technology and business hub. The GBA is composed of 9 mainland cities in Guangdong Province, Hong Kong and Macao Special Administrative Regions, forming an innovative city cluster. In 2019, the Central Government of China issued the “Outline Development Plan for GuangdongHong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area”, clarifying the new stage of social and economic integration in the GBA. In the past 25 years, Hong Kong has had the lowest annual GDP growth rate among the 11 cities in the GBA30. Analyzing the innovation environment and performance of cities in the GBA is of great significance to fostering the development of Hong Kong’s technology and innovation industries. We selected the 5 fastest-growing cities for comparison, namely Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Zhuhai, Dongguan and Zhongshan. Benchmarking is carried out according to the following criteria: • GERD as a percentage of GDP • GERD • Number of PCT international patent applications 30 CEIC data 2 Current Status of Hong Kong’s Technology and Innovation Industries
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