Blueprint turns up a $5m blank

ONE of life's greatest pleasures is to have your prejudices vindicated. So it was with glee that I read the $5 million Hongkong 21 report prepared for the Business and Professionals Federation by the Booz Allen & Hamilton consultancy. As a veteran reader of consultancy reports, including one I was foolish enough to have a hand in commissioning, I fully appreciate they bring new meaning to the word anodyne. But I must say Messrs Booz Allen & Hamilton have scaled new heights. Let us consider some of their telling insights into the steps which need to be taken to prepare Hongkong for the next decade. Strengthen Hongkong's identity Continue structural change Enhance cosmopolitan orientation Emphasise policy continuity Build dominant regional support sectors Encourage specialised industrialisation To put it another way Hongkong should tell the world that it is a dynamic, go-getting place. Secondly, progress is preferable to stagnation. Thirdly, this cosmopolitan community should continue to be, er, cosmopolitan. Fourthly, consistent government policy is preferable to erratic government policy. And fifthly, (this one's a really new idea), Hongkong should build up its position as a regional centre and, here's another brainwave, encourage specialisation rather than generalisation. Building on these ideas Unfinished Business would like to add some recommendations, available to Sunday Money readers at somewhat less than $5 million. These exclusive recommendations examine micro and macro issues. First, businesses should be aware it is hot in summer, therefore they need to install air-conditioning and, more important, turn it on when it is hot. Second, businesses should examine the feasibility of opening bank accounts - careful study shows money is much safer in banks (excluding BCCI etc) than it is behind filing cabinets. Turning to government policy, the administration should consider displaying a neon sign outside all government premises saying something like ''Hongkong Means Business,'' preferably in at least three languages. This would demonstrate an unambiguous commitment to economic growth. Even more macro in its implications, is the need to make sure Hongkong remains within the Asia-Pacific region because if it moves, it will no longer be among the world's fastest growing economies. These recommendations, like Hongkong 21, are only intended to provide a ''general framework''. They also represent bargain basement value, coming free of charge. It is a great mystery to me why on earth the federation's 25 corporate sponsors were happy to spend their money on a study which told them what they already knew. Introducing the report, Mr Vincent Lo, the federation's chairman, modestly described the study as ''the crystallization [sic] of the collective wisdom of the best minds in Hongkong''. Looking down the voluminous list of those consulted and actively participating, it reads like a Who's Who of Hongkong business. ARGUABLY, the value of the exercise was simply to bring all these people together and get them thinking and talking about the future. Equally valuable is the establishment of a framework for future planning strategies. The report, in one of its few lucid recommendations, suggests the establishment of a permanent private sector think-tank. Butthe positive aspects of the federation's work and objectives are massively overshadowed by the ridiculously trite report. Consultant's reports, even when staggeringly obvious, often have a function. Mr Denis Healey, when he was Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer, used to say in private the value of an International Monetary Fund consultancy was to provide a prescription for action which the government knew it had to take but would prefer to blame on an external body. The same applies to companies bringing in consultants to introduce what is euphemistically called ''rationalisation'', but in reality means firing a large number of people. Therefore one should not knock consultants for uttering the obvious. But there are occasions when slightly more is required. Taxpayers in Hongkong may well ask why the Government reaches for external consultants, almost by reflex, when faced with a problem. A careful study of their work, costing vast sums of money, will almost certainly reveal most of their recommendations are ignored. The Business and Professionals Federation set out with the aim of uttering something more than the obvious. They were understandably concerned about the lack of joint planning for the future between the existing and future powers. They were keen to identify where Hongkong fits into the shape of things in China's fast expanding economy. They wanted to know how the territory's industries would adjust to the structural changes in the world economy. These are all perfectly valid questions, requiring answers with at least a modicum of meaning. Hongkong 21 either makes recommendations which are so general as to be meaningless, or are already being implemented. Worse still the report often chooses to close its eyes to the political reality of relations between Britain and China. Everybody knows everything would be better if relations between the two countries were on a firmer footing. However they are not and will not become so by uttering exhortations such as ''we should drop our 'insular mentality' towards China and openly discuss issues of common interest''. Someone should tell the author of these words that discussions require at least two participants. Like hot spices, consultants are useful in small amounts, but they can easily ruin the dish and charge massively for so doing. Unfinished Business is a fortnightly column which will be looking at business matters deserving further investigation. We welcome readers' suggestions and comments. There is no need for suppliers of information to be identified, although we will need to verify any material received. Unfinished Business can be contacted in confidence on telephone number 549-2470 or by fax at 547-5478.