SPEAKING NOTE
CONFIDENTIAL
PROSPECTS FOR BRITISH TRADE IN HONG KONG
We supply about 14% of Hong Kong's imports of capital goods but could perhaps improve our performance in the raw material and consumer goods sectors. With the support of the Department of Trade, the Trade Commission has sought to use our success in major project business to focus attention on other market opportunities.
2.
The planned visit at the end of May by Mr John Stanley, Minister for Housing and Construction, with senior representatives of civil engineering firms, will provide a valuable opportunity to encourage British contractors to contribute to private and public sector construction programmes, especially the Island Line extension to the Mass Transit Railway and the Hong Kong Government's impressive housing programme.
3. The Department of Trade has done its best to encourage textile manufacturers to follow-up Mr Parkinson's successful textile mission of September 1980. In 1980 Hong Kong imported about £750 million worth of fabrics for the making-up trade. We should be attacking the quality end of the market where, except in wool textile fabrics, we lag behind the United States, Germany and even Switzerland.
4. Britain comes a poor third after Japan and the United States as an industrial investor in Hong Kong. We might increase our share of the market for raw materials and semi-manufactures by making more use of this British-administered territory as a manufacturing base. For example in the field of electronics, British radio and TV manufacturers want protection against Hong Kong exports to the United Kingdom. Could they not regard Hong Kong as an opportunity rather than a threat and seek to collaborate in joint ventures and
the joint development of markets in the Far Eastern region?
CONFIDENTIAL
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