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A word about communications. Hong Kong is the best deep-
water port available to Guangdong, and also the terminus of the South
China railway system. It also is a centre of world-wide sea and air
transport. Obviously these aspects are important to China. The through-
train is important in itself and also as a beginning of an improved
train service in general. They clearly wished to proceed fairly-soon
to through-freight services and this is already being examined.
We saw developments of the old and new ports at Whampoa. They
are impressive, but depth makes the ports impossible for larger ships
of over 20,000 tons and particularly the new generation of container
ships and tankers. They are considering how to overcome this, one
possibility being more extensive trans-shipment into barges in Hong Kong
or other facilities here. They are considering a deep water port at
.Nantou, but I gathered it was a long-term plan rather than an immediato
possibility.
They envisage the further development of air services from
Hong Kong to major cities in China in support of tourism and freight.
As you know Shenzhen has been made into a special municipality stretching
from the Pearl River Estuary to Mirs Bay. It covers an area larger
than Hong Kong. A good deal has been written about this in the local
press, I will repeat what we were told. The general plan is to
develop it for agriculture, light industry and tourism and to enlist
Hong Kong participation.
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