Blog

Striving for continuous growth

A gist of the blog:

The Hong Kong economy turned into robust growth of 4.7% over a year earlier in the first quarter of 2018, which is the highest quarterly growth rate in the past seven years. Nevertheless, we should not be complacent and the HKSAR Government will continue to drive economic development with a forward-looking and strategic approach, to support the innovation and technology industry as well as other industries with advantages and potentials, and build a diversified economy that can create more career development opportunities for our young people.

The Innovation and Technology Bureau has recently announced a 3-year pilot Technology Talent Admission Scheme to provide a fast-track arrangement for technology companies and institutes to recruit from overseas and the Mainland technology talent that are in short supply or not readily available in Hong Kong. While the industry generally supports the Scheme, I noted there are concerns that the Scheme will induce competition for local workers. In order for Hong Kong’s innovation and technology industry to break new ground, we should invest aggressively in nurturing local talent and at the same time attracting more talent and companies to Hong Kong. Only with the pooling of talent and through the agglomeration of enterprises, we can enhance the capacity and capability of the entire industry and benefit from bigger economies of scale. These job opportunities and prospects will in turn attract more local talent to join the industry, resulting in a virtuous cycle.

May 13, 2018