More than 80 per cent of surveyed mainland Chinese companies plan to grow their overseas presence, with Hong Kong listed as their top choice for a professional services platform to support expansion, the Trade Development Council (TDC) has found. The council’s survey, published on Tuesday, also showed that about 94 per cent of respondents were…
It made perfect sense for Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu to hold public consultations on both the city’s first five-year plan and the last policy address of his current term at the same time. Many have been putting forward views that warrant serious consideration. It is clear that Lee needs to be bolder…
Hong Kong will fly the national and regional flags at half-staff at various government sites on Tuesday to mourn the late former Chinese premier Zhu Rongji. The government said on Sunday it would lower the flags at government headquarters in Admiralty, Government House, all control points and checkpoints at border crossings and Hong Kong International…
I’m a little perplexed and bemused by the brouhaha surrounding Hong Kong’s decision to draft its first five-year plan, as if the sky is falling in around the city’s famed laissez-faire economy. Predictably, Yale University’s Stephen Roach (he of “Hong Kong is over” fame) warned in a commentary last month that “Chinese-style central planning” could…
Regional cooperation is a key priority in Hong Kong’s first five-year plan. In the fourth of a five-part series on the plan, we look at how life in the Greater Bay Area can get better, with the right policies. Read part one here, part two here and part three here. Eager to escape Hong Kong’s…
Hong Kong is betting big on the Northern Metropolis with a university town as a core engine. In this third of a five-part series on the city’s first five-year blueprint, we look at the talk of the town. Read part two here. Hong Kong is a city that has among the highest concentration of top…
Former Hong Kong opposition leader Wu Chi-wai, who has been granted permission to enter the United Kingdom, will not be deported despite earlier complications in his attempt to settle in the country, the British immigration minister has confirmed. In a written reply on Thursday to former Hong Kong governor Chris Patten, UK Minister for Migration…
What will a stronger international financial centre look like for Hong Kong? Doubling down on yuan internationalisation is a key focus, experts say in this second of our five-part series on the city’s first five-year blueprint. Read part one here. With a symbolic press of a button, top officials and securities regulators from Hong Kong…
In late 2002, former Chinese premier Zhu Rongji visited Hong Kong and sought to put steel in the spine of the city’s establishment that was floundering under an economic slump and a ballooning deficit. “Even if you spend all your fiscal reserves three years from now, what is there to fear?” he asked his dinner…
As the government completes a public consultation exercise to craft the city’s own five-year plan to align with national development, the first of this five-part series looks at key questions, starting with the need for such a blueprint. Economist Heiwai Tang has a line he likes to use on free-market purists: “The market is almost…