INDUSTRY AND TRADE
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During the past year Hong Kong made representations, outside the field of cotton textiles which are covered by their own particular arrangements, to the Governments of South Africa, Austria, France and the Republic of Ireland.
Hong Kong continued to follow closely developments in the European Economic Community, particularly in regard to the free movement of goods within the community. On July 1, all internal customs duties were abolished and restrictions on the movement of industrial goods between members states were formally removed. As the community already provides the Colony with a market worth about $700 million a year, Hong Kong is particularly concerned that the process of creating the Common Market should not result in limitations on the community's external trade.
The Second United Nations Conference on Trade and Develop- ment (UNCTAD) was held in New Delhi in February and March. A Hong Kong official attended the conference as a member of the United Kingdom Delegation. The main topic of interest to Hong Kong at this conference concerned proposals for a general scheme to give preferential entry to the exports of developing countries to the markets of developed countries. What emerged from the conference was a resolution that developed countries should grant such preferential tariff treatment. No substantive scheme was form- ulated, however, but a Special Committee on Preference was set up to consider the issues in detail. This committee met for the first time in December 1968. Its deliberations were mainly of a pro- cedural nature on that occasion, substantive discussion being post- poned until early in 1969.
The Australian scheme of preferences for imports from less- developed countries, introduced under a waiver granted by the Contracting Parties to the GATT in 1966, was continued and slightly expanded during the year. Hong Kong was excluded from preferential treatment on certain of the two hundred odd items now encompassed by the scheme on the grounds that it was already sufficiently competitive; but, after representations had been made to the Australian Government, was reinstated on all but nine of them.
Some of the initial tariff reductions agreed upon during the Kennedy Round of Trade Negotiations, concluded in 1967, were