Editor's Note: The 33rd APEC Economic Leaders' Meeting will be held in Shenzhen, Guangdong Province, on November 18.

From Singapore to Sydney, from Jakarta to Bangkok, from Mexico City to Lima—Guangdong's links with APEC economies have never been just lines on a map. For 37 consecutive years, Guangdong has been Singapore's largest provincial-level trading partner in China. In Thailand, new energy vehicles made in Guangdong are entering households across the country. In Indonesia, industrial parks with Guangdong participation are helping reshape the local industrialization landscape. In Peru, the direct shipping route from Guangzhou's Nansha to Chancay Port has brought the two sides of the Pacific closer than ever.

Behind these figures and cooperation are real people, real stories that cross mountains and seas and friendships that have grown with mutual benefit.

Recently, a team from South visited HDB towns in Singapore, high-tech parks in Malaysia, new industrial towns in Vietnam, fishery cold-chain terminals in Papua New Guinea and distribution hubs for trendy goods in South Korea. It also visited enterprises and communities from APEC economies in Guangdong, recording from a first-person perspective the real picture of Guangdong and its "friends" moving from goods trade to industrial cooperation and then to people-to-people bonds and cultural integration.

In 1784, the American merchant ship Empress of China left New York Harbor and sailed toward the Pearl River. That historic voyage began a trading relationship that has lasted more than two centuries.

Today, Guangdong—the southern Chinese province where the Pearl River meets the sea—remains China's leading province for trade with the United States. In the first eight months of 2026 alone, trade between Guangdong and the USreached 685.27 billion yuan, up 6.9 percent year on year. Even through periods of trade friction, goods have never stopped flowing.

The modern relationship, however, goes far beyond moving shipping containers. It is a deeply intertwined supply chain, stretching from the bright lights of New York City to the breakfast tables of Guangzhou.

Behind Taylor Swift's record-breaking Eras Tour—a global spectacle that spanned five continents and grossed more than $2 billion—and behind the dazzling visuals of the Academy Awards and the Coachella music festival lies the technology of ROE Visual, an LED manufacturer headquartered in Shenzhen.

"From Taylor Swift to U2, Ed Sheeran, all those mega stars are working with our production companies," said Frank Montero, Managing Director of ROE Visual US. "Mega projects like the Adele performance in Munich were basically a landmark for us."

Two decades ago, "Made in China" in the display industry largely meant low cost. Today, it means cutting-edge technology. "Ten or twenty years ago, when I first entered this industry, Chinese displays were all cheap. People would only look for them because they were cheap," said Steven Lee, COO of ROE Visual US. "But after all these years, the highest-end brand right now is ROE—not just in China, but in the entire world. This is a reflection of China's technological and manufacturing capability, as well as its supply chain advantage."

About one-third of the LED displays imported into the UScome directly from Guangdong, backed by a complete industry chain covering chip packaging, precision molds and module assembly. Companies such as Leyard and Absen, both listed on China's A-share market, are headquartered in Shenzhen.

"Quality is the lifeline of our products," said James Li, Presidentat the Display Product Line,of Unilumin, ROE's parent company. "If the screen suddenly goes black during a live performance or broadcast, the overall impact would be enormous."

Such dominance of the supply chain keeps the industry resilient, even during trade disputes. "Even if tariffs are raised, American buyers still cannot bypass Chinese suppliers," Lee said, noting that the tariff on LED screens remains at zero. "They can't do without our products. There is simply no way to replace this industry."

The trans-Pacific exchange, however, is hardly confined to the glitz of the entertainment industry. In Brawley, California, Eric Brandt, the third-generation CEO of One World Beef, oversees the loading of frozen, grain-fed beef. His family has been ranching in the Imperial Valley since the 1930s.

"Fortunately, we are very close to the Port of Long Beach," Brandt said. "After we package the beef and freeze it, it can be on a ship within three to four days. It takes about 21 days to reach the port in China." Most of it enters through Shenzhen before making its way to Guangzhou, Dongguan and Shanghai.

Beef short ribs have found a cultural home in Guangdong, a province of 127 million residents where they are a staple of the morning dim sum tradition. "In Guangdong, it is common for people to have the habit of having dim sum, which includes beef short ribs," said Ye Wenxiang, China General Agent for OWB Packers. "The dim sum made from them is quite suitable for local tastes."

The beef is now sold in supermarkets such as Sam's Club and served at restaurant chains such as Jiumaojiu and a range of hot pot brands.

For Brandt, the connection is deeply personal. His first trip to China, in 2012, took him to Guangzhou, where he discovered the local culture and the many ways it cooks beef.

"I love global trade. I love the Chinese culture," he said. "We've had some unfortunate ups and downs due to political reasons for market closures or reopenings, but we have stayed dedicated. It's really about relationships, and I cherish relationships that are lasting for decades."

Beyond the dinner table, this symbiotic industrial relationship is giving rise to entirely new consumer sectors. Pickleball, born in Seattle in 1965, has found its manufacturing capital in Dongguan, Guangdong. America's fastest-growing sport, it counted 24.3 million players in 2025.

"The world's pickleball products today, especially paddles, are concentrated in Dongguan or the Greater Bay Area," said Alex Yuen, President of Ramsports. Nearly 200 manufacturers and upstream and downstream suppliers in the region now work together, making paddles for 85 percent of the world's pickleball brands. The core production area has an annual output of nearly 400 million yuan.

American entrepreneur Richard Gossett based his company's headquarters in Shenzhen to stay close to these factories. "The factories are within a two-to-three-hour drive, sometimes just a one-hour drive from our facility," Gossett said. "That's another reason we chose Shenzhen as our headquarters—to be close to all the manufacturers of paddles, balls, bags and clothing."

The partnership is paying off. "We just broke 10,000 paddles in our first six months selling one particular paddle," Gossett said. "We're on our way to selling 20,000 to 30,000 paddles of this one—it's called the Typhoon."

The sport has also become a bridge between people. Young players from both nations cross the Pacific to compete, and although they are 13 time zones apart, Gossett and Yuen speak every day.

"Pickleball is a sport that fully blends sport and social connection," Yuen said. "China is so good at manufacturing products, and we have that relationship to work together," added Sara Paran, Vice President of Ramsports.

Behind this entrepreneurial agility sits a far more established corporate base. According to the 2026 Special Report of the American Chamber of Commerce in South China, 82 percent of surveyed member companies reported profits last year, and 75 percent plan to reinvest in China in 2026.

"More than 75 percent of our 2,300 members in South China have been here for 15 to 25 years or more. They are very mature, very established. And nearly all of them remain profitable," said Harley Seyedin, the chamber's president.

"They are making better profits in Guangdong than they make in any other place in China, or any other place in the world for that matter." The survey ranked Guangzhou as China's top destination for investment and reinvestment for the ninth consecutive year, followed by Shenzhen.

In 2025, China-UStrade reached 4.01 trillion yuan, with Guangdong alone accounting for 945.32 billion yuan—nearly a quarter of the total. Jianyu Zhang, Chairman of the China General Chamber of Commerce – USA, said the real change today is that companies are redesigning their global supply chains for resilience.

"The Greater Bay Area's standout advantage lies in its ability to combine innovative, advanced manufacturing, a mature supply chain system and globalization capabilities exceptionally well," he said.

Ultimately, the vast exchange of capital and goods is a story of people, and the historical ties binding the two regions run deeper than modern commerce. More than 160 years ago, roughly 12,000 laborers from Guangdong helped build the Transcontinental Railroad—one of America's greatest engineering feats.

A section of Bay Parkway in Brooklyn, New York, was officially co-named "Canton Avenue" in honor of those workers and the broader Chinese immigrant community on October 2, 2026.

"The Transcontinental Railroad would not have been accomplished without Chinese immigrants," said Charles Stephen Farr, Executive Director of the Secretariat of the Guangzhou International Sister-City Universities Alliance. "Their legacy remains an important part of America's history."

Today, that connection lives on through youth exchanges. Over the past two years, tens of thousands of young Americans have traveled to China to study and play sports, while Chinese students have performed at New York's Lincoln Center.

"What they read in the newspaper or watch on TV is not always 100 percent correct," Farr said. "The walls of communication have just broken down. Now they are talking to each other not as Chinese or as Americans, but as friends, as brothers and sisters."

From the ranches of California to the dim sum restaurants of Guangdong and from the workshops of Shenzhen to the stages of Las Vegas, the Pacific may separate the two economic powerhouses, but they work in remarkable sync.

Guangdong's unique position rests on three pillars: a complete manufacturing base, a massive consumer market and a century-spanning human connection. As the world's two largest economies navigate an era of uncertainty, this trans-Pacific symphony proves a simple, undeniable truth: one plus one is always greater than two.

Reporter: Guo Zedong

Cameraman: Guo Hongda, Ou Xiaoming

Video editor: Ou Xiaoming

Voice-over: Xie Hongzhou

Photo: Guo Hongda

Cover: Lai Meiya