Analysts consulted by MNA see the package of policies announced by the Chinese government as providing better incentives for local professionals, families or retired people to move and live in the Greater Bay Area.
The third Coordination Committee meeting for the development of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau Greater Bay Area, held on November 6 and chaired by the Chinese Vice Premier Han Zheng, resulted in the announcement of some 15 policies aimed at making it easier for Macau and Hong Kong residents to live, work, study and start businesses.
Some of the policies concern real estate, with property purchases to be made easier for Macau residents in mainland cities within the Greater Bay Area, and with local residents not being required to provide evidence of their duration of residence, study or employment, nor to meet any conditions regarding the payment of individual income tax and social security.
Other policies concern education, facilitating the children of Macau residents to enjoy the same standard of education within the mainland cities of the GBA as that offered to children of mainland residents in public education services in pre-primary institutions.
For political commentator, Sonny Lo, the policy measures advocated by the coordination committee clearly aim at helping more young people and members of middle-lower classes in both Macau and Hong Kong to move into the GBA and thereby easing the housing shortage in both Macau and Hong Kong.
“The GBA’s vast physical space can and will provide more land and housing units, with relatively cheap prices, to the comrades in Macau and Hong Kong. The policy implication is to reduce the housing pressures on the governments of both Macau and Hong Kong, thus stabilizing the two special administrative regions in the long run,” the professor told MNA.
“The keyword here is space. Physical space in the GBA will hopefully bring about political space to the Hong Kong government, and more educational, living and career developmental space to more Hong Kong people. The same logic can be applied to Macau, which is not experiencing political pressure and controversies like Hong Kong”.
However, he warned that “some recent surveys in Macau have pointed to the lack of confidence on the part of many Macau young people to move and work in the mainland.
In June the results of a survey conducted by the University of Macau showed that most Macau residents respondents are not willing to work or live in other cities in the GBA or in Hong Kong, citing as the main reason an ‘unsuitable lifestyle’ for them
“As such, it is urgent for the Macau government, the local tertiary institutions, and universities to speed up the processes of offering more adult and continuing education programs so as to equip the young Macau people with the necessary skills and basic knowledge to move into the mainland, and to compete with mainlanders if they wish to do so,” he noted.
A family package
Meanwhile, legislator Agnes Lam considered the property and education policies announced of extreme importance for couples or families working or looking to move to the GBA.
“I’ve heard a lot of couples or people trying to make business in China saying that it is already very hard for them to place their children in the local school system. If you want to put your kid in a better school if you are from Macau and Hong Kong you will have to put them in an international school, which is very expensive, so not a lot of people can really afford it […] If the kids can’t go too, or if they can’t buy a house, then there’s no point for someone to go wholeheartedly there,” the legislator told MNA.
For Lam, a job alone would not be enough to attract a professional from Macau to move to the mainland, but the policies created a package with education, business and housing elements that were more attractive.
“Some people doing business in China are not able to buy an apartment in Macau anyway, so the policy allowing them to purchase housing there is a positive step […] At least in some parts of Guangdong the price is still low and people can still afford to live there and this could solve the issue of housing and education,” she noted.
Meanwhile, Jeff Wong, the senior director of capital markets at JLL Macau, saw the policies as being extremely attractive for local retired residents wanting to spend their later years somewhere with better and cheaper life quality.
“On the whole I don’t think it will impact the market too much, because locals still prefer to live in Macau […] for people living in China and working in Macau and coming every day it is still not very practical, but for retired people it could definitely be a better choice to live in China, although they would likely not want to live in first-tier cities like Shenzhen or Guangzhou where the cost of living is still quite high,” he added.
Many of the policies announced by the Chinese government concerned the financial sector with the loosening of restrictions regarding the formation of partnership-based law firms, more support on developing a bonds market in Macau, or with SAR residents to be supported if they wish to buy wealth management products in banks based in mainland cities within the Pearl River Delta.
For Sonny Lo since the Macau legal sector has been traditionally demanding trainees and professionals with bilingual skills, mastering both Portuguese and Chinese languages, local legal professionals may not really be interested in going into the GBA where the Portuguese language is not so frequently used as in Macau.
However, he believed construction and insurance professionals will have more incentives to move into the mainland due to its vast business opportunities.
The local politics expert also saw opportunities for health professionals and businesses, as more public health care and nursing homes will have much more room for expansion in the GBA, with more elderly and nursing homes able to be built with the participation of investors from both Macau and mainlanders.
Hong Kong the main reason?
When questioned if she believed the policies announced were a response by the central government to the unrest in Hong Kong and some of the perceived economic woes that plague the SAR, legislator Agnes Lam considered that the people taking part in the protests were not the kind wanting to go to the Greater Bay Area.
The Guangdong Province government has even announced that 26 out of 3,115 new civil service vacancies will be set aside for applicants from Hong Kong and Macau.
“I think the policies will attract people who have a stronger Chinese identity and don’t mind moving there.[…] It might be good for some Hong Kongers who are not happy with the situation [in Hong Kong], and don’t mind moving [to the mainland] and now have better support to go,” she added.
Meanwhile, for Sonny Lo, as the housing shortage is a far more serious issue in Hong Kong than Macau, the measures could relieve the SAR government of some public dissatisfaction.
“Beijing anticipates that the political controversies and deadlock in Hong Kong may delay the process of building artificial islands off the Lantau coast, and as such, allowing the people of Hong Kong to reside and move into the GBA easily will hopefully relieve the pressure off the Hong Kong government.
