is due not only to a stronger weeding out of those who have not paid their subscriptions, and people leaving Hong Kong, but also to the fact that the Society has not in the last year or so pursued such an aggressive recruitment campaign, although 59 have joined the Society since last April. It is of course difficult to determine how many members a Society such as this should have. The downside is that financially we may not be as healthy as we hoped, but the upside is that there is more room for our popular excursions, and presumably there is less administration, although I am not sure Mrs. Sharon Bruce would agree. At any rate your council is keeping this aspect under surveillance, and I urge you to encourage your friends to become members at the very modest rate of $250 p.a.
There is, however, one aspect of our membership on which I have to report on which there has been no further progress: I refer to corporate membership. Last year letters sent to many leading companies in Hong Kong produced no positive response. For the benefit of those who are not aware of this may I reiterate that for the comparatively small sum of $10,000 p.a. it was intended to give certain privileges to corporate sponsors particularly in the area of acknowledgement our publications. Amongst the reasons for this move, apart from putting the Society on a firmer financial basis, was to bring to those corporations' attention the Society's achievements and interests and hopefully involve them more in the historical and academic side of Hong Kong. We shall continue to pursue this, and if any of you this evening are in a position to influence your corporations, I hope you will do so. The companies that we did approach have in fact given money to our parent Society in London, so we do feel we are on strong ground.
Publications
The annual Journal is, as my predecessor said, “our major contribution to knowledge of the Hong Kong region and further afield." It is a very important part, if not the most important part, of our activities and it is paramount that we keep up the academic standards. All those who have received the 1988 Journal (the 1989 one will appear later this year) will, I am sure, agree that standards have been maintained and for this we have to thank Dr. Patrick Hase. It is no small feat to produce a Journal in one's spare time. The Journal is well known in many overseas academic institutions and has became an important
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