Guangzhou is actively lobbying the central government for a high-speed rail link with Hong Kong, a senior official from the provincial capital said yesterday.

"The relevant authority has hired an engineering consultancy company to do a feasibility study," said Chang Min, vice-secretary-general of the municipal government of Guangzhou.

The new link would involve high technology and Maglev (magnetic levitation) could be one of the options, said Chang.

It won't be a simple parallel line to the existing Kowloon-Guangzhou railway, he stressed. "We hope the stops between Guangzhou and Hong Kong would be as few as possible, non-stop would be the best."

Amid a wave of further integration between Hong Kong and the Pearl River Delta region, governments of both sides attach great importance to the construction of connecting infrastructure such as the proposed Hong Kong-Macao-Zhuhai bridge.

"Given the expected two-digit annual growth of the Pearl River Delta regional economy, the current infrastructure cannot satisfy the growing demand for goods and people flow in the area," said Chang.

Meanwhile, neighbouring provinces such as Hunan, Jiangxi and Sichuan will also use the channels in the Greater Pearl River Delta region to export and import their resources, he added.

(HK Edition 08/06/2003 page7)