GUANGZHOU: South China's Guangdong Province is expecting its service industry to play a significant role in its economic growth during the 11th-Five-Year-Plan (2006-10).

According to the province's ambitious development plan of the service industry, Guangdong's ratio of service industry in its economy will be developed to more than 45 percent in 2010 and more than 50 percent in 2020.

And the service sectors have been planned to be able to employ more than 40 percent of the province's working population by 2010.

Last year Guangdong's industrial output value came to 1.06 trillion yuan (about $136 billion), compared with 475.5 billion yuan ($60.96 billion) in 2000. The province's service industrial output value represented 12.4 percent of the country's total in the previous year.

Guangdong governor Huang Huahua said service industry would be given top priorities for development before 2010.

Meanwhile, Huang urged to further co-operate with Hong Kong and Macao SAR in developing Guangdong's service industrial development in the following years.

Guangdong will benefit from the expansion of co-operation, as Hong Kong and Macao, where service industry has been well-developed, have already become international trade hubs and financial centers.

"The two Chinese special administrative regions' advanced information channels and management systems of international standard in service industry would certainly help Guangdong speed up the development pace of its service industry in the coming years, "Huang told a work conference on Guangdong's service development in Guangzhou, capital of the province, early this week.

Huang believed Guangdong's service industry has great potential in development in the years ahead. He has also promised to step up investment for the province's service sectors in the future

Huang is also expecting the province's service industrial development to help improve the province's industrial structure and support Guangdong's manufacturing sector.

With a large number of heavy-weight offshore companies setting up their production facilities in Guangdong, the province has recently become a 'factory of the world'.

The provincial government has listed the sectors of information service, finance service, technology supporting service and culture as promising industries during the 11th Five-Year Plan.

Huang urged relevant departments and cities to seize the golden opportunities to boost development of the province's service industry in the following years.

The government will also try to improve the management of the service and the consumer market in the near future, Huang added.

Guangdong has already become a popular investment location for Hong Kong's service industry and more than 40 percent of firms opened by Hong Kong suppliers on the mainland are in the province.

Besides, Hong Kong's service industry has taken the neighbouring Guangdong Province as an ideal business place because of its strategic location, low cost and especially because of the benefit from CEPA.