麻豆社

Xiong鈥檃n, a small rural town in China, is set to become a city of 5 million people over the next decade. That's the government's plan at least. But could the whole thing end up as an expensive white elephant?

Ed Butler visits the site of this mega project two hours south of Beijing to discover some excited locals and a rather poorly attended fashion show. Could this bucolic setting become the next Shenzhen or Pudong? We hear some scepticism from Yan Song, professor of urban planning at the University of North Carolina, and from economist Michael Pettis of the Guanghua School of Management at Peking University.

Producer: Laurence Knight

(Picture: Site of new government buildings to be constructed in Xiong'an; Credit: 麻豆社)