Hong Kong needs to roll out the welcome mat for Asean talent. Here’s how

Hong Kong must play up its usefulness, lower entry barriers, boost Asean-China collaboration and offer more scholarships
Asean can be a critical plank in Hong Kong’s re-industrialisation, and engagement is vital to the city’s relevance and competitiveness. There is no time to waste

Brian Y. S. Wong

Published: 10:00am, 16 Sep 2023

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Asean is one of the world’s fastest-growing economic blocs, expanding by an estimated 5.5 per cent last year despite global headwinds, and has a young and dynamic population of over 660 million. To stay relevant and competitive, Hong Kong must not only look towards Southeast Asia but embrace it.

To succeed, we must seek to add value to the 10 (soon 11) members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, position ourselves as a gateway for their capital and companies in accessing Northeast Asia, and a cradle for Asean talent.

Whilst statistics point to a population rebound in Hong Kong – thanks to its post-pandemic reopening and much-needed Top Talent Pass Scheme – it is imperative that our city develops a coherent and forward-thinking population policy amid a falling birth rate. Hong Kong can wait no longer for substantive reforms and measures to render ourselves more accessible and attractive to Asean talent.

Young, skilled and aspirational, Asean talent is not just integral to our economic growth, but also our status as an global city. Hong Kong’s policy changes should encompass three dimensions.

First, we must create value propositions for skilled labour and entrepreneurs from Southeast Asia. This means looking beyond our crucial, yet insufficient, function as a bridge between China and the rest of the world.

With the rise of Singapore, Jakarta and Shanghai as economic and financial exchanges, Hong Kong must not only shore up its strengths as a yuan exchange and listing hub – drawing upon Asean workers’ knowledge of regional dynamics in expediting yuan internationalisation – but also as a “petrol station” for knowledge-intensive industries: pumping the “oil” of knowledge, connections, exposure and professional upskilling into financial and legal workers from the region.

People crossing the road in Central on April 11. Hong Kong can draw upon Asean workers’ knowledge of regional dynamics. Photo: Jelly Tse

On one hand, this calls for a strengthening of the upsides for those relocating to Hong Kong – whether in issuing multi-entry, longer-term visas in accessing mainland China, through structured networking platforms, communities and events connecting Southeast Asian entrepreneurs with Chinese investors and regulators, or by tailoring legal counselling services with robust China expertise to the needs of Asean clients.

In raising our attractiveness for ultra-high net worth individuals from Indonesia, Malaysia and Brunei, Hong Kong must cultivate greater expertise in Islamic finance, which would also enable our outreach to other parts of the Islamic world.

On the other hand, both the government and private actors in Hong Kong should further reduce the barriers to entry.

Housing and rental subsidies, targeted education enrolment support (e.g. boosting international school capacities), more robust healthcare insurance and provisions by employers and cultural associations drawing upon the Chinese diaspora and Southeast Asian expatriate communities are all concrete measures that can improve the city’s affordability and navigability for Asean workers. Indeed, some employers are already offering larger pay packages to woo Asean talent.

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Second, we must recognise that Southeast Asia can serve as a core pillar of our re-industrialisation – specifically in aiding the growth of our fledging high-end manufacturing industries, such as biotechnology, health tech and nanotech.

The Greater Bay Area has been tipped by Beijing to serve as an advanced technological engine of development within China, and Hong Kong has a key role to play in fusing financial innovation and wherewithal with an extraordinarily high concentration of skilled STEAM (science, technology, engineering, the arts and mathematics) labour. But living up to this vision requires us to attract adaptable and well-trained workers.

The booming start-ups in larger Asean economies, such as Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand, would benefit from a regional presence in Hong Kong, taking advantage of our world-class academic institutions and concentration of cutting-edge researchers. Reciprocally, Hong Kong-based investors and start-ups stand to gain from the spillover effects, whether through talent cross-pollination or the facilitation of further, robust partnerships between these companies and their mainland Chinese counterparts.

We must also seize upon the talent influx to foster an ethos of Sino-Asean collaboration, equipping mainland talent with an understanding of Southeast Asian economies and markets, and vice versa. It is through such knowledge exchanges that Hong Kong moves beyond a conventional bridging role and adds value for both China and Southeast Asia.

A sizeable population of Malay, Thai and Vietnamese speakers in Hong Kong, even if proficient in English, would put pressure on our government to expand the breadth of cultural and language education, thus equipping future generations to navigate an increasingly important region.

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Third, we must seek to deepen Hong Kong’s academic collaboration with Asean, including scholarships. Indeed, the Belt and Road Scholarship programme has gone from awarding 10 places in Hong Kong universities in 2016/17, to 99 in 2021/22.

But these are insufficient. Hong Kong’s government must scale up the scholarships available to students from Southeast Asia while also tapping their young professionals. The Asia Global Fellows programme at the University of Hong Kong, for example, offers mid-career professionals a chance to study and collaborate here.

Hong Kong must also make available more Asean internships and job-matching services to local students, especially those from less privileged backgrounds who may struggle with finding employment locally. Public and private-sector leaders have a pivotal role in establishing partnerships with their counterparts in Southeast Asia.

Hong Kong has no time to lose in courting Asean.

Brian Y.S. Wong is an assistant professor in philosophy at the University of Hong Kong, and a Rhodes Scholar and adviser on strategy for the Oxford Global Society