28 October 2007

Imagine a Hong Kong more prosperous and successful than at any time in living memory – a Hong Kong with booming stocks and property, a Hong Kong with a flood of inward investment, a Hong Kong with a pool of highly skilled young professionals to maintain our status as Asia ’ s economic super-hub for decades to come. In today ’ s Hong Kong, it doesn ’ t take much to imagine such a scenario. In most respects, it is already a dazzling reality. Our city is enjoying unprecedented economic success boosted by the mainland ’ s extraordinary pace of growth. In so many ways, we have never had it so good. However, in one vital respect, we are failing – and failing to the extent that we now face a crisis of our own making. While most of our economic fundamentals are firmly in place, one crucial ingredient is missing in Hong Kong ’ s economic jigsaw that could seriously undermine our future growth – and that crucial ingredient is human resources. Ask any recruitment company or any expanding business hungry for fresh recruits, and they will tell you a stark truth: There simply aren ’ t enough highly skilled young people in the market. A quick look at the South China Morning Post Classified section illustrates this with 70 pages of job advertisements. This is not a situation that has arisen overnight. Over the past three decades, Hong Kong ’ s birth rate has plummeted. If current trends continue, one in four people in Hong Kong will be aged 60 and above by 2030.

If we want to maintain our competitiveness and our prosperity it is essential that we attract more talented people to live and work in Hong Kong. We need to bring in people of calibre – people whose contribution will not cost Hong Kong people jobs but generate more jobs. Our government has recognised this necessity but it has so far failed to do enough to bridge our talent gap.

High-profile new schemes have been launched to attract talented migrants but they are failed to draw sufficient numbers. The Quality Migrants Scheme - introduced in June last year with some fanfare and a quota of 1,000 people a year - drew less than 900 applications in its first year, most of them from the mainland. The number approved so far is just 132 – a drop in the ocean for a city with a working population of more than 3 million.

The government ’ s intentions are good but its actions so far have been inadequate. We have sat back and waited for talented professionals to form an orderly queue to come to Hong Kong. We have sent out a lukewarm message and, not surprisingly, we have received a lukewarm response. Our government ’ s own Commission on Strategic Development concluded in a report last month that we must build up a crucial mass of quality human capital to support our economy. With each passing day, the need to begin that building process grows more acute. I propose that the government sets up a special task force to go out and seek the quality migrants that Hong Kong needs. In the same way that we have a Hong Kong Tourism Board to attract visitors and Invest Hong Kong to attract investors, we should set up a dedicated task force to identify and attract the human capital we so badly need.

In the same way that the tourism board and Invest Hong Kong have offices in major cities around the world, this task force should have a global presence. It must have centres in major capitals to attract people to our city. This will, of course, involve a considerable investment but it is an investment we cannot afford not to make.

In a competitive global environment, sitting back and waiting is not an option, We must let the world know that Hong Kong ’ s doors are open to talented individuals with something to contribute, wherever they come from.

If Hong Kong is such a good place to live and work, you may ask, why are these people not knocking on our door already? My answer to that is that people don ’ t always know what they are missing unless you tell them.

A crucial part of this task force ’ s remit should be to advertise and promote the benefits of living in Hong Kong – our free economy, our cosmopolitan lifestyle, our low taxation, our safe streets, our top class medical facilities, our excellent transport links, our high level of English and our wealth of opportunity for the enterprising and capable.

We have our problems, but we are working hard to resolve them. In his policy address, the chief executive pledged to continue to take measure to improve our air quality and to tackle the shortage of international school places. These are pledges I believe Mr Tsang must and will take seriously, and problems I am certain we have the ability to overcome.

This influx of new talent is nothing to be feared. These people will in fact create new jobs for lower skilled workers by setting up new enterprises, by pushing our economy forward and by keeping us at the very forefront of the regional boom.

Hong Kong is a city of migrants. Our current prosperity was created by the flood of people who poured into Hong Kong in the 1950s and 1960s, bursting with ideas, energy and initiative in a city that gave them the freedom to realise their potential and to fulfil their dreams. Half a century ago, at the start of Hong Kong ’ s first economic transformation, our city had a population of some 2.5 million – and more than half of them were aged 25 or under. It was upon the rock of this lean, hungry, dynamic demography that our extraordinary success story was built. Today, I feel that our most pressing challenge is to recreate that hunger and dynamism – to attract to our vibrant city a new wave of quality professionals who will help create the foundation of a continuing success story for the century ahead. We must begin a determined and focused global search and we must begin it without delay. Our economic future depends upon it.