Asia-Pacific delegates discuss local governance experience in Hainan

About 400 delegates from 29 cities in 12 Asia-Pacific countries attended the 2026 United Cities and Local Governments Asia-Pacific Council Meeting held in Haikou, Hainan province, from Wednesday to Friday. Representatives from 17 Chinese member cities participated, sharing local governance experience and reaching consensus with Asia-Pacific member cities on advancing friendly exchanges and practical cooperation across various fields.

The opening ceremony of the UCLG Asia-Pacific 2026 Council Meeting and main forum took place on Thursday.

Lu Xiangdong, vice-president of the Chinese People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, said the Asia-Pacific region should deepen mutual trust, strengthen cooperation and move forward together amid a turbulent and changing international landscape, and that local governments and cities bear responsibility and have great potential to contribute. China will unswervingly expand high-level opening-up and continue to provide new opportunities for the Asia-Pacific and the world through new achievements in Chinese modernization, he said.

Zhang Yong, mayor of Haikou, said in his opening address that Haikou is linking Asia-Pacific resources with higher-level opening-up. He said the city is willing to use the UCLG Asia-Pacific Council as a platform to deepen practical alignment with member cities in green and low-carbon development, smart city governance and blue economy cooperation, promote the implementation of more cooperation projects and jointly write a new chapter in sustainable urban development in the Asia-Pacific.

The dividends of Hainan Free Trade Port's island-wide special customs operations, launched Dec 18, are being translated into cooperation results. ASEAN has remained Haikou's largest trading partner. In the first half of 2026, the total value of Haikou's goods imports and exports with ASEAN reached 16.093 billion yuan ($2.42 billion), up 173.6 percent year-on-year.

Relying on the policy advantages of the Hainan FTP and the benefits of Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership rules, a cooperation model featuring "ASEAN raw materials entering Hainan island, value-added processing in Haikou, radiating to the domestic market and selling back to the Asia-Pacific region" is taking shape at an accelerated pace.

Flows of people, goods and air routes are being intensified in tandem. Supported by visa-free policies for 88 countries and bilateral mutual visa exemption arrangements, personnel exchanges between Haikou and ASEAN are more convenient. Haikou has opened direct flights to major ASEAN cities, including Singapore, Jakarta, Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur. Tourism cooperation is expanding from mutual visits of tourists to coastal cultural tourism, health and medical care, conferences and study tours.

Iv Sokhom, Cambodian consul general in Haikou, said Cambodia has cooperation potential in agriculture and agricultural product processing, tourism and hotels, logistics and warehousing, and green energy, and is willing to strengthen alignment with Haikou. He encouraged more ASEAN investors to go to Haikou and welcomed Haikou enterprises to visit Cambodia to explore processing projects.

Bernadia Irawati Tjandradewi, secretary-general of UCLG Asia-Pacific, noted that FTP policies can be truly translated into development results only when they are implemented in specific scenarios such as ports, industrial parks and markets and supported by local governments in areas including land, approvals, public utilities, labor and community trust. The gathering of city, consular and business representatives in Haikou built an important platform for translating policy advantages into cooperation projects and deepening regional connectivity, she said.

At the meeting, Haikou signed a letter of intent on establishing friendship city relations with Male, Maldives. The two sides will carry out exchanges and cooperation in commerce, agriculture, education and tourism. The Haikou Comprehensive Bonded Zone Management Committee also signed a memorandum of cooperation with the Subotica Free Zone Administration of Serbia and the Belt and Road Culture and Economic Development Association of Serbia and China.