Being a 'connector' for China is no longer working for Hong Kong

 

 Being a 'connector' for China is no longer working for Hong Kong

Hong Kong's decadeslong strategy relying on being a "superconnector" for the Chinese economy -- channeling capital, business expertise and talent into and out of the mainland -- is insufficient to power the city's economic growth at a time China itself is slumping, writes Donald Low.
 
With its economic growth contracting for three of the last five years, the city needs to rethink how to stay relevant in a less globalized and more polarized world, the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology professor argues.
 
"Hong Kong's economy became overly specialized in a few service sectors," he writes. "Policymakers should seize the opportunity the current malaise offers to engage in a far-reaching exercise on how to adapt or even reinvent the economy for the future."