Also the original developer of the giant Canal Walk shopping centre and Ratanga Junction, Wragge is CEO of LRPS China, which is developing the R4bn mixed-use Forest Park development in Ningxia province in northwest China.

Wragge was one of 50 foreigners from 20 countries honoured by the government in the Great Hall of the People on Tiananmen Square.

Vice-Prime Minister Zeng Peiyan and Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference members presented the awards, gold medals.

“I like to think we made a very real and positive contribution to the growth of the capital city of Yinchuan through our Forest Park development,” he said. “Although it is clearly a commercial endeavour it has had a catalytic effect of accelerating the fusion of the twin cities of Yinchuan into one.”