Wednesday, January 24, 1973
"Many Japanese tourists visit Hong Kong. About 400,000 came
last year, and I hope they enjoyed themselves. They were extremely welcome.
Over one million tourists visited Hong Kong last year, and I greatly
enjoyed receiving the millionth. By some strange co-incidence she was a remarkably
pretty girl. We are expecting many Japanese to come to the International
Arts Festival in Hong Kong in February and March at which some of the
most famous artists in the world of music and ballet and drama will be
performing, including your own New Japanese Philharmonic Orchestra. The
Hong Kong Tourist Office in Tokyo has all the details about this and
anything else in Hong Kong.
Large Stake
"Apart from these developments in trade and tourism Japanese
business has been taking an increasingly large stake in the economy
of Hong Kong. Japan is now second only to the United States as a source
of overseas industrial investment. In addition Japanese firme have recently
obtained several of the major government contracts. These have included
the extension of the runway to the airport, and a new desalting plant
to increase water supplies - the latter far the biggest plant of its
kind in the world. These two contracts alone were worth US$78 million,
and I am aware of considerable Japanese interest in the possibility of
constructing an underground railway, for which the figure, at 1971
prices, is expected to be over US$1,100 million.
/"We from