TNAG-2977-FCO40-1469-Economic-policy-in-Hong-Kong-1982 — Page 39

(1)

conducted in

July

no

5.3

The Quarterly Business Survey

1982 indicated that manufacturers in general experienced

improvement in business in the second quarter, contrary to their earlier expectations of a mild upturn. According to the

manufacturers, declining orders and high interest rates were the major problems they encountered, and these problems were

expected to continue into the third quarter.

This is

consistent with the order-book positions of a selection

large manufacturers included in the monthly employment, payroll and orders-on-hand(2). There

some spare capacity exists

indications that

of

survey on

are

in

the

the

manufacturing sector because of the recession. Towards

end of September and early October, however, there were

reports of orders in the garment industry picking up.

Property

5.4

In the third quarter, the additional supply of

property, in terms of the total usable floor area of all

buildings completed, was 772 000 square metres, representing an increase of 13% compared with the third quarter of last

year. Taking the first nine months together, there was а

reduction of 6%. Despite this reduction, completions so far

this year were still substantial, given that completions in

/ 1981

(1) The Quarterly Business Surveys conducted by the Census and Statistics Department seek from respondents their impression of business conditions in the immediately preceding quarter and their opinion regarding business prospects in the forthcoming quarter. The sample used for the survey consists of some 800 firms taken from various sectors. It is a selection of the largest firms in each sector plus a random sample of medium sized firms.

(2) The monthly survey on employment, payroll and orders-on-hand includes 200 large manufacturing companies selected on the basis of employment in September 1979, in addition to a small number of construction and other non-manufacturing companies. Each month a questionnaire is sent to each of these companies, requesting information on the number of persons engaged as at the end of the preceding month, on the amount of payroll for the preceding month and on orders-on-hand in terms of months as at the first day of the current month. Its purpose is to provide short-term economic indicators at monthly intervals. As the survey is not based on a scientifically selected random sample, the results do not necessarily reflect the performance of the economy as a whole, but they do give some indication of the direction of change.

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