Hong Kong could become irrelevant curiosity
When I was growing up in Australia, we commonly found 'Made in Hong Kong' on a great number of manufactured items. Now, it doesn't matter what part of the world you are in, you will very often find 'Made in China' and almost never 'Made in Hong Kong'.
This simply highlights the obvious fact that Hong Kong's manufacturing industries have migrated across the border.
As well as once having had a major manufacturing industry, Hong Kong was a major logistics hub for the region.
It was also a cheap and attractive tourist destination and for a long time the closest anyone could get to China. Last but not least in importance was the role that Hong Kong played as the English-speaking middleman in trade between China and the rest of the world. With the manufacturing all but gone, tourism having diminished because of the high cost of a holiday in the SAR, and the logistics under real long-term threat from all of the new and cheaper port facilities in the mainland, all that is left is the English-speaking middleman role.
However, with the deliberate shift away from English in the education system, Hong Kong is quickly heading towards being an irrelevant curiosity, bilingual maybe in Cantonese and Putonghua but not overly competent in either. Mainland Chinese have a clear advantage when directing their language learning energies at their native Putonghua, with English as a second language. Clear communication is always at the heart of every successful transaction in life. If Hong Kong wants to position itself as a major service centre then I suggest that it puts its linguistic energies into English and Putonghua, possibly at the expense of Cantonese.
It all comes down to a choice between economic survival versus cultural preservation and obscurity.
STEVE BUTLER
Mid-Levels
