Strong national growth should help lift Hong Kong out of recession this year, financial chief says

Name: Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam to visit Beijing for talks on reviving economy
Uploaded: 2021-01-03T07:12:14.000Z
Duration: 56 s
Description: Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam to visit Beijing for talks on reviving economy

After two years of shrinking gross domestic product, city poised to return to economic expansion in second half of 2021, Paul Chan says

Mainland China’s rising growth will be crucial for turnaround, as will success in fight against Covid-19, he argues

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Phila Siu

Published: 3:12pm, 3 Jan 2021Updated: 11:20pm, 3 Jan 2021

Beijing’s grand plan to stimulate domestic growth should help lift Hong Kong out of recession by the end of the year, the financial chief has predicted.

While businesses relying on tourism should expect prolonged difficulties, the turnaround after two years of contraction could also be accelerated by progress in containing the coronavirus pandemic, including through a mass vaccination drive, Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po said on Sunday.

The economy has withered under the triple onslaught of the launch of the trade war between the United States and China in 2018, the eruption of anti-government protests in the summer of 2019 and the arrival of Covid-19 last January.

Gross domestic product has contracted for five consecutive quarters, declining 3.5 per cent in real terms in the third quarter in 2020 from a year earlier. In 2019, GDP shrank 1.2 per cent. The government estimates the economy will contract by 6.1 per cent in 2020, the most on record. But Chan saw light at the end of the tunnel.

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Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam to visit Beijing for talks on reviving economy

“The difficulties may still be there in 2021, but the turning point is emerging,” he said on his blog.