Hong Kong’s 5-year plan needs ambition to match Beijing’s expectations
Hong Kong’s first five-year plan will be judged not by how many initiatives it assembles. Instead, it will be judged by whether it explains where the city intends to be by 2030 and how it will get there.
The consultation document covers the expected ground. It includes the Northern Metropolis; Hong Kong’s roles as an international financial, trade, maritime and aviation centre; integration with the Greater Bay Area and supporting the Belt and Road Initiative; and social priorities such as housing, education and manpower. A final section covers culture, sports, tourism and green living.
Much of this will sound familiar from past policy addresses and government documents. That is understandable in a consultation paper seeking public views before the plan is completed, but the final plan cannot merely repackage familiar initiatives. It must express ambition commensurate with the national 15th five-year plan and subsequent documents elaborating national priorities.
Mainland five-year planning is not simply an exercise in compiling policies. It defines the advances sought, aligns institutions and resources, and sets targets against which progress can be assessed. Hong Kong operates in a competitive national environment, and its first plan cannot be tentative.
Mission framing would help. A mission begins with a desired outcome rather than a list of measures. It connects different bureaus and sectors, mobilises finance and expertise, and tells the public what success will look like. The Northern Metropolis itself should be a mission: exceptional design and integration that create economic, social, environmental and land value.
In finance, deepening equity and bond markets, expanding asset and wealth management, developing fintech and consolidating Hong Kong’s role as the leading offshore renminbi centre are important but already expected.
Hong Kong ranks third in the latest Global Financial Centres Index. Its plan should explicitly aim to strengthen and advance that global position by 2030. This is not about chasing a league table position but asking what distinctive capabilities would earn greater global recognition.
For example, Hong Kong should become the premier platform for financing and supporting the global development of China’s next generation of technology and new energy enterprises. That requires sustained engagement with mainland companies, regulators and other stakeholders, building on the work of the Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing and the Stock Connect programmes.
Hong Kong should not view sectors such as electric vehicles, batteries, solar and wind power as investment opportunities elsewhere. The city should become a proving ground and service platform for their practical deployment. The city has made good progress on electric vehicles, but its port is not ready for electrification of terminals for ocean-going vessels and smaller local craft.
A five-year mission could unite the relevant authorities with port operators, shipowners, utilities and investors to create the necessary infrastructure and business models. The city is preparing for green maritime fuel bunkering, and electrification should be part of the same forward-looking port strategy.
The less glamorous end of new energy matters, too. Hong Kong’s existing buildings offer a major market for energy-saving technology, digital management and retrofit services. That market will not emerge at scale until government provides the policy signal, assembles a credible pipeline and creates the conditions for private capital to act.
Hong Kong should also look beyond fashionable technologies. Artificial intelligence will reshape every economy, but many future capabilities will arise from understanding the physical world better. Atmospheric, ocean and climate science will be essential to decarbonisation, adaptation, renewable energy and ways of working with nature, not merely against it.
Hong Kong’s universities already possess substantial scientific capacity, including national key laboratories and extensive mainland and international partnerships. The government can focus this capacity around missions important to Hong Kong and the nation while using research to train talent, create specialised jobs and attract philanthropy and investment.
Finally, Hong Kong must strengthen its intellectual role. Trade, finance, shipping, aviation, technology and science are being reshaped by geopolitics and geoeconomics. A genuinely global hub cannot confine itself to practical transactions; it must also convene serious discussion about the forces changing those transactions.
London’s financial influence rests partly on its ability to interpret emerging risks, develop ideas and shape global debates. Hong Kong already hosts many international financial gatherings, but it should also become a leading intellectual centre for transition finance.
Hong Kong has been fortunate to receive national backing for new endeavours. The Shanghai Gold Exchange has introduced Hong Kong-deliverable contracts and its first offshore warehouse here, while the 15th five-year plan supports a Hong Kong commodity trading ecosystem.
Hong Kong also enjoys unique market access through its various Connect schemes and offshore renminbi infrastructure. These privileges are not available to other international financial centres since these channels are established exclusively between the mainland and Hong Kong.
These are significant advantages but not entitlements to preferential treatment. Mainland provinces and cities are intensely ambitious. Doors might be opened for Hong Kong, but it must generate the ideas, capabilities, standards and businesses to walk through them. National backing should raise, not lower, the ambition of Hong Kong’s five-year plan.
Hong Kong’s first five-year plan is an opportunity to replace incrementalism with direction. It should select a handful of missions, state the outcomes sought by 2030, assign leadership, integrate policy and finance, and report progress.
Ambition without credible delivery is rhetoric, but a plan without ambition is merely an inventory. Hong Kong needs to show it possesses both the foresight to define its distinctive role and the governing capability to fulfil it.
Contributed by Prof. Christine Loh. The article was published on SCMP: