Expanding Business and Professional Services

61.    With some 470 000 employees and accounting for 12 per cent of GDP, business support and professional services are another pillar industry of the Hong Kong economy.  They comprise a wide range of professional and supporting services for business activities, such as legal, accounting, architecture, engineering, planning, surveying, human resources, management consultancy, technical testing, product development and distribution, market research, conference and exhibition, and information technology.

62.    Apart from serving local enterprises, Hong Kong's business and professional services are also exported to the Mainland and other areas in Asia.  We shall continue to assist these service industries through relevant G2G platforms.  Under the National 12th Five-Year Plan, the Mainland will devote greater efforts to developing modern service industries to lift the share of the service industries in the economy by four percentage points by 2015.  Such scale of expansion far exceeds Hong Kong's GDP in one year.  This will present vast business opportunities to the sectors concerned in Hong Kong.  For continuous enhancement of the CEPA mechanism, the Chief Executive has announced that the HKSAR Government and the Ministry of Commerce will set up a joint working group to assist the sectors concerned to solve problems they encounter in gaining access to the Mainland market under CEPA.