As recently announced, the American Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong (AmCham) will hold a 10-month seminar series to discuss ways to help the city maintain its “international leadership roles”.
The 10 monthly panel sessions, running from this month to June next year, will discuss Hong Kong’s position in the new global environment, the business opportunities in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area and Belt and Road Initiative, and other topics.
These seminars will be the first in-person event series held by the chamber since the COVID-19 pandemic hit Hong Kong two and a half years ago. The chamber has partnered with several leading US businesses to present the seminars, and key speakers will include Yang Yirui, deputy commissioner of the Foreign Ministry’s office in Hong Kong.
This initiative is definitely great news, since it comes despite the rising China-US tensions. In the current global scenario (pandemic/post-pandemic world, high inflation and possible recession, multiple conflicts), collaboration and cooperation are required; therefore, these seminars are a great way to show all the many opportunities offered by Hong Kong, the GBA and BRI, and also to show how US companies can tap into those many opportunities.
I, who have always advocated for cooperation and mutual realization of the existing opportunities, find this series of seminars a great move.
Undoubtedly, Hong Kong remains one of the most important financial centers in the world, and offers many opportunities not only to US companies, but to companies from all over the world. As I mentioned in my last article, according to the latest “IMD World Competitiveness Yearbook 2022”, published by the International Institute for Management Development on June 15, Hong Kong was ranked the world’s fifth-most competitive place, up from seventh in 2021.
This came after Hong Kong maintained third place globally in the “Global Financial Centres Index 31” report, published on March 24 by Z/Yen from the United Kingdom and the China Development Institute from Shenzhen. The GFCI report has been released in March and September every year since 2007. In the “GFCI 31”, 119 financial centers were assessed, and Hong Kong came in third with an overall rating of 715.
Also, a few months ago, the Canada-based Fraser Institute once again ranked Hong Kong as the world’s freest economy in the “Economic Freedom of the World: 2021 Annual Report”, relying on data collected in 2019. Hong Kong has been at the top of the annual rankings issued by the Fraser Institute since its first economic freedom report in 1996.
However, there is still one elephant in the room: Hong Kong needs to reopen to the world. The latest move of reducing the mandatory hotel quarantine for overseas arrivals to three days from a week was indeed a great move, but it is not enough.
As admitted by the government, inbound tourism remains virtually frozen, posing a constraint on the pace of economic recovery.
There is undoubtedly a tendency among many Hong Kong people to compare Singapore with Hong Kong, usually as a way to praise the former while criticizing the latter. Hong Kong people habitually find fault in their own backyard only to cite Singapore as the model of perfection. The only apparent reason for this tendency is that Hong Kong and Singapore share many similarities in economic structure, reliance on finance and trade, as well as size of territory and population.
So if we compare once again Hong Kong with Singapore this time, we will see that Singapore’s approach to COVID-19 is quite similar to that of Europe, i.e., masks have not been required in most indoor settings since Aug 29. Deputy Prime Minister Lawrence Wong Shyun Tsai said last month that masks will be mandatory only in two settings, the first being healthcare facilities, residential-care homes and ambulances, as well as indoor premises within hospitals and polyclinics. They will also be required on public transport.
Despite the gradual easing of restrictions, the number of infections in Singapore has also declined steadily, while the number of daily hospital cases has halved, from more than 800 in July to below 400.
I said before that Hong Kong’s latest moves, albeit relevant, are not enough, and they are not enough because Hong Kong is the only financial center in the world that keeps such restrictions. Hong Kong has managed the pandemic in a great way these last two years, but it is time for the special administrative region to open up a bit more in order not only to maintain its status as one of the world’s most important financial centers, but to enhance it; otherwise, Hong Kong risks losing talent and many international conferences to other financial centers such as Singapore.
If we look at the whole picture, this whole picture shows a great image of Hong Kong: As seen in the rankings mentioned above, Hong Kong is as resilient as ever despite the pandemic and despite the social unrest prior to the pandemic, remaining one of the most important financial centers in the world. Undoubtedly, things have certainly been complicated in Hong Kong these last three years. Since 2019, the city has faced unprecedented economic challenges. As we all know, despite Hong Kong being in great shape in 2017 and 2018, the economic situation worsened afterward, as 2019 and 2020 were two of its most challenging years socially and economically because of the months-long social unrest and the COVID-19 pandemic, and early 2022 proved to be very challenging again, this time due to the fifth wave of COVID-19 in Hong Kong, which, unlike the previous waves, ravaged the city, disrupting normal activities and unfortunately causing many infections and deaths.
The multiple indexes mentioned in the first paragraphs of my article show us that there is a clear international acknowledgment of Hong Kong’s role as one of the most important financial hubs in the world, a financial hub that does not seem only to maintain its position, but to enhance its position year after year, as long as it gradually opens up.
Leaving aside this only issue or concern, Hong Kong’s future seems bright, as acknowledged by all the rankings and by the AmCham seminar series. Hong Kong is currently involved in many projects that will not only help it maintain its status as one of the world’s most important financial centers, but to enhance it, such as the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area development. In China’s 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-25), the central government again recognizes Hong Kong’s potential at the national level and has reaffirmed its commitment to support the HKSAR in strengthening its status as an international financial, trade and logistics hub.
The author is a fintech adviser, a researcher and a former business analyst for a Hong Kong publicly listed company.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.