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INDUSTRY AND TRADE
Hong Kong maintains a certification of origin system to establish the origin of the goods which Hong Kong exports and to meet the requirements of the importing authorities. The Trade Department administers and safeguards the integrity of this sytem, and issues certificates of origin where required. Other government-approved certificate-issuing organisations are the Hong Kong General Chamber of Commerce, the Indian Chamber of Commerce, the Federation of Hong Kong Industries, the Chinese Manufacturers' Asso- ciation of Hong Kong, and the Chinese General Chamber of Commerce.
External Commercial Relations
Hong Kong possesses full autonomy in the conduct of its external commercial relations. The Governor has been formally entrusted with executive authority to conduct external relations on behalf of Hong Kong, namely to conclude and implement trade agreements, whether bilateral or multilateral, with states, regions and international organisations and to conduct all other aspects of external commercial relations. Hong Kong is a separate contracting party to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), the basic aim of which is to liberalise world trade and protect the most-favoured-nation principle. GATT is the cornerstone of Hong Kong's external trade relations. The Multi-Fibre Arrangement (MFA), which aims at the orderly development and expansion of international trade in textiles, provides the framework within which Hong Kong negotiates bilateral restraint agreements with textiles importing countries.
The Hong Kong Government pursues a free trade policy. Hong Kong is one of the best examples of GATT principles in action and the success of the policy is evidenced by the steady rise in the value and sophistication of Hong Kong's exports in recent years. Within the context of this free trade policy Hong Kong's commercial relations are designed to ensure that Hong Kong's trading rights in overseas markets are protected and that its international obligations are fulfilled. The most important of these rights and obligations are contained in the GATT and the MFA.
GATT
On April 23, 1986, Hong Kong became the 91st contracting party to the General Agree- ment on Tariffs and Trade (GATT). Hitherto, Hong Kong had already been participating in GATT activities from within the United Kingdom delegation and the United Kingdom spokesman for Hong Kong was invariably a Hong Kong Government official. The arrangement enabled Hong Kong to take positions that were different from those of the European Economic Community (EEC), and, by implication, the United Kingdom. With effect from April 23, 1986, the Head of the Hong Kong Government Office in Geneva was appointed as the Permanent Representative of Hong Kong to the GATT.
In the United Kingdom declaration concerning Hong Kong's separate GATT contracting-party status, the British Government formally informed the Director-General of the GATT that Hong Kong was a separate customs territory possessing full autonomy in the conduct of its external commercial relations and of other matters provided for in the GATT. At the same time as the British Government made this declaration, the Chinese Government made a parallel declaration to the effect that, as from July 1, 1997, the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region will continue to meet the requirements for a separate customs territory to be deemed to be a contracting party to the GATT. By their respective declarations, therefore, the British and Chinese Governments have taken the necessary concrete steps to secure the continuance of Hong Kong's participation in the GATT in the years leading to and beyond 1997.