25 years that were 'beyond all expectations'

JIN DING/CHINA DAILY Over the past few weeks I have been asked to summarize my assessment of the first 25 years of the existence of the Macao Special Administrative Region, and my standard answer has been "beyond all expectations". First of all, no one predicted in late 1999 that Macao's gross domestic product would grow phenomenally and its per capita GDP would figure among the highest in the world within just a few decades. The SAR has also made considerable progress on the social welfare, public administration, public housing, education and public health fronts, alongside an overall modernization and, last but not least, digitalization drive — virtually every resident's Macao One Account has made life much more convenient, and convenience is something that locals appreciate more than everything else, apart from public security and political stability. Without "one country, two systems", which also applies to Hong Kong and, let's hope, to Taiwan in the not-too-distant future, Macao's politico-economic success over the past 25 years would, most probably, can never have been achieved. I think the point is that since then so many things have happened here, mostly for the better, such as its phenomenal economic growth, modernization drive, administrative reforms, the setting-up of Forum Macao as a platform for economic, commercial and even cultural relations between China and Portuguese-speaking countries that has brought together 10 countries with a combined population of over 1.6 billion people, the setting-up of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area and the establishment of the Guangdong-Macao In-depth Cooperation Zone in Hengqin, as well as the government's "talent acquisition" import scheme.