Resource on Hong Kong

About Hong Kong

Why do business in Hong Kong?

Hong Kong is a Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China. Following British rule from 1842 to 1997, China assumed sovereignty under the 'one country, two systems' principle. At the south-eastern tip of China, Hong Kong covers Hong Kong Island, Lantau Island, the Kowloon Peninsula and the New Territories, including 262 outlying islands. Between Hong Kong Island and the Kowloon Peninsula lies Victoria Harbour, one of the world's most renowned deep-water harbours.

• Total area: 1 104 square kilometers
• Land developed: less than 25%
• Country parks and nature reserves: 40%

Climate

Hong Kong's climate is sub-tropical, with temperatures dropping below 10 degrees Celsius in winter and exceeding 31 degrees Celsius in summer. It is warm, sunny and dry in autumn, cool and dry in winter, and hot, humid and rainy from spring to summer.

• Average annual rainfall: 2 214.3 mm
• Wettest month: August
• Driest month: January
• Winter: January-March
• Summer: July-September

Population

Hong Kong's population was approximately 6.92 million in 2007. People of Chinese descent comprise the vast majority of the population, with foreign nationals comprising 5%.

• Population density: 6 410 people per square kilometer
• Crude birth rate: 10.01 per 1000 (provisional figure)
• Percentage of population Chinese descent: 95%
• Other significant national groups
• Philippines (136 323 total)
• Indonesia (131 497 total)
• Thailand (28 375 total).

Languages

Chinese and English are the official languages of Hong Kong. English is widely used in the Government and by the legal, professional and business sectors. Trilingual professionals who speak English, Cantonese and Putonghua play a vital role in the numerous enterprises trading in Hong Kong or doing business with mainland China and Taiwan.

• Cantonese speakers: 88.7% of population
• Putonghua speakers: 1.1% of population
• Other Chinese dialect speakers: 5.8% of population
• English speakers: 3.1% of population
• Other language speakers: 1.3% of population

Education

Over 50 international schools offer more than nine curricula, providing children with an education compatible with their home country. These include the Australian, British, Canadian, French, German/Swiss, Japanese, Korean, Singaporean and US systems as well as the international baccalaureate. Graduates of Hong Kong's international schools are accepted at the world's leading universities. Several Hong Kong universities offer opportunities for part- or full-time life-long learning opportunities.

Literacy:

Age 15 and over has ever attended school
total population: 93.5%
male: 96.9%
female: 89.6% (2002)

School life expectancy (primary to tertiary education):

Total: 14 years
male: 14 years
female: 13 years (2006)

Education as percent of GDP:

3.9% (2006)

Economy

World's 1st Freest Economy (Source: The Heritage Foundation, Index of Economic Freedom 2007). Hong Kong's economy is characterized by free trade, low taxation and minimum government intervention. It is the world's 11th largest trading economy, with the mainland of China as its most significant trading partner. Hong Kong is also a major service economy, with particularly strong links to mainland China and the rest of the Asia-Pacific region.

• Currency: Hong Kong dollar
• GDP: HK$1,612.6 billion (2007)
• GDP per capita: HK$232,836 (2007)
• Real GDP growth: 6.3% (2007)
• Labor force: 3.64 million

• Financial services, trading and logistics, tourism, and producer and professional services are the Four Key Industries in the Hong Kong economy. They have been the driving force of Hong Kong's economic growth, providing impetus to growth of other sectors, and creating employment.
• Financial services cover a wide range of services including banking, insurance, stock brokerage, asset management, and other financial services.
• Logistics refers to the process of planning, implementing and controlling the movement and storage of goods (including raw materials, goods in progress and finished goods), services and related information from the point of origin to the point of consumption. The activities include freight transport, freight forwarding, storage, postal and courier services. Trading firms are closely associated with logistics activities. For analytical purposes, statistics on the economic contribution and employment situation of trading services are presented together with those in respect of logistics services.
• Tourism covers inbound tourism and outbound tourism. Inbound tourism covers retail trade, hotels and boarding houses, restaurants, other personal services, travel and airline ticket agents, and passenger transport services, yet pertaining only to that segment of services provided to visitors to Hong Kong. Outbound tourism covers travel and airline ticket agents as well as cross-boundary passenger transport services, yet pertaining only to that segment of services provided to Hong Kong residents travelling abroad.
• Professional services cover legal, accounting, auditing, information technology related services, advertising and related services, engineering and related technical services, and architectural design and surveying services.
• Producer services refer to services for use by other companies (i.e. intermediate consumption) in the local economy, as well as exports of services to companies and individuals. To avoid overlapping of economic activities in the Four Key Industries, statistics of "other producer services" are compiled. "Other producer services" refer to producer services other than those covered in the key industries of financial services, trading and logistics, tourism and professional services.

Religion

Religious freedom is one of the fundamental rights enjoyed by Hong Kong residents. There are a large variety of religious groups in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR), including Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism, Islam, Christianity, Hinduism, Sikhism and Judaism.

Transport and Communications

Airports: 2 (2007)

Airports - with paved runways: total: 2

Heliports: 5 (2007)

Roadways: total: 2,009 km
paved: 2,009 km (2007)

Telephones - main lines in use: 3.87 million (2007)

Telephones - mobile cellular: 10.55 million (2007)

Television broadcast stations: 55 (2 TV networks, each broadcasting on 2 channels) (2007)

Internet hosts: 812,137 (2007)

Internet Service Providers (ISPs): 17 (2000)

Internet users: 3.77 million (2006)

Tourism

The total tourism expenditure associated to inbound tourism reached HK$117.3 billion in 2006. Overall visitor arrivals to Hong Kong in 2006 increased by 8.1% to 25.25 million, which was lower than what the Hong Kong Tourism Board (HKTB) had expected. The HKTB had initial expectations of 27 million visitor arrivals. Visitor arrivals from Mainland China exceeded 13.5 million. Arrivals in December 2006 exceeded 2.4 million, setting an outright record for a single month.

In December 2006, there were 612 hotels and tourist guest houses in Hong Kong, with 52,512 rooms.