Export
Issue No. 5 - April/June 2002
Island of Opportunity
Hong Kong
Joyce Mak in Hong Kong leads an extremely active South Australian trade mission whose results belie the apparently small size of the former Crown colony. Hong Kong is what she terms the “natural gateway to China”.
Hong Kong is a small island with an area of a little more than 1,000 sq km and it has a population of about 6.8 million. GDP per capita in 2001 was approximately A$48,000. Total trade was about A$780 billion in 2001, with total exports recorded at approximately A$360 billion.
If you are wondering why a small territory could achieve such impressive statistics, don't forget China, the emerging dragon in Asia, and remember that Hong Kong happens to be the natural gateway for China in the ’90s. In terms of outward investment, Hong Kong was the largest source of outward foreign direct investment (FDI) in Asia in 2000 (approximately A$120 billion), according to the United Nations’ World Investment Report.
The SA Government’s Hong Kong office was established as far back as 1976. In the ’80s the mission was to help newly arrived migrants to settle in South Australia—helping them secure a place to live, maybe buy a house and locate a school for their children. By the ’90s the emphasis had switched to promoting trade and investment—helping South Australian companies to make inroads to the Hong Kong and China markets and paving the way for Hong Kong companies interested in investing in South Australia.
Currently, the Hong Kong office geographically covers Hong Kong, southern China (including Yunnan, Guangxi, Guangdong, Fujian and Hainan Island) and Taiwan. Trade between South Australia and these territories has been estimated at a little more than A$1 billion in 2001 with investment estimated at approximately A$4 billion during the past couple of years. The biggest export items to China were commodities and crude material (more than A$300 million); for Hong Kong it was food and live an...
