Mixed feelings in Hong Kong over China's clampdown on mainland traders

2015-04-13

Travelers from mainland China prepare to go shopping in downtown Hong Kong, April 12, 2015. RFA

Moves by authorities in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen to ban multiple buying trips to neighboring Hong Kong amid a row over "parallel traders" sparked mixed reactions in Hong Kong on Monday.

The new rules limit people with a household registration, or "hukou," in Shenzhen to one visit a week, and are aimed at stopping the army of small traders who buy up goods in the former British colony for resale back across the internal border.

According to Michael Tien, Hong Kong delegate to China's National People's Congress (NPC), the rules will only initially apply to new applications for cross-border travel permits, sparking criticisms from campaign groups.

"We can't just cancel at a stroke all of the existing travel permits, but they will be subject to the new rules when they come up for renewal," Tien told reporters.

"We expect that the new rules will cut incoming cross-border visitor numbers by about 30 percent, or 4.5 million visits [until the annually issued permits expire]," he said.

The new rule follows angry demonstrations in several Hong Kong shopping districts in recent weeks amid broader political tensions across the immigration border between the two, which was maintained after the 1997 handover to Chinese rule.

Hong Kong officials and politicians have condemned the protests, saying they will harm the city's international image as a safe and courteous place of business.

But protest organizer Leung Kam-shing, who heads the Sheung Shui Parallel Traders' Concern Group, said the moves don't go far enough.

"These new measures only apply to new applications for entry permits [to Hong Kong]," Leung said. "That majority of holders of existing permits will be able to continue making multiple trips."

"So we are predicting that large numbers of parallel traders will continue to cross into Hong Kong via the main border crossings," he said.

Leung called for all permits to be brought within the one trip per week limit. But he added: "Something is better than nothing."

Parallel trading raises public ire

Parallel trading first drew public ire in Hong Kong in the wake of the melamine-tainted infant formula scandal of 2008 that left at least four mainland Chinese infants dead and thousands more suffering from kidney stones, when traders bought up supplies of milk powder in Hong Kong to sell to worried parents.

Under the terms of its 1997 handover to Chinese rule, Hong Kong has maintained its own food and public safety standards, as well as an independent immigration and customs border with the mainland.

The small amounts typically carried by the traders on each cross-border trip enables them to evade customs duties normally charged to importers and then pool goods for sale on the other side.

However, not everyone in Hong Kong welcomed the news.

The owner of a pharmaceutical business in Yuen Long, near the Chinese border, said his company will suffer a huge loss of turnover as a result of the ruling.

"I think that more people are going to lose their jobs," the business owner told RFA.

And a pharmacy owner in the border town of Sheung Shui said he expected turnover to drop by 30-40 percent as a result.

"As a retail outlet, of course we are in favor of free movement across the border," the pharmacy owner said. "Now, the immigration policy between Hong Kong and Shenzhen keeps changing, to the extent that we don't even know if we can make a living."

A mainland visitor to Hong Kong surnamed Fang, who frequently crosses the border on shopping trips, said the restrictions were made in a big hurry.

"It's not fair on people from mainland China, because Hong Kong people can come to the mainland as often as they like, but we're not allowed to go to Hong Kong," Fang said.

"It should be limited to one trip per day, because some of us come to go shopping or to do business, not just for parallel trading," she said. "We are profitable for Hong Kong."

Hong Kong chief executive Chun-ying Leung said the move is only aimed at curbing professional parallel traders, who also include Hong Kong residents.

"We are concerned about, and will punish severely, anyone engaging in parallel trading, whether they are from Hong Kong or mainland China," Leung warned.

The buying will continue

Icarus Wong, of the Hong Kong Civil Rights Observer, said the new policy won't stop people from Shenzhen buying goods in Hong Kong for legitimate reasons.

"Hong Kong needs to think about ways to diversify its economy, not just rely on the economic growth brought by tourism," Wong said.

Chinese customs officials have detained around 33,000 individuals in connection with parallel trading in the border city of Shenzhen in the past four years, official media reported last month.

The latest tensions have further highlighted divisions between the mainland and Hong Kong, whose population is made up largely of refugees from the ruling Chinese Communist Party regime, many of whom do not even describe themselves as Chinese.

Reported by Lin Jing for RFA's Cantonese Service, and by Xin Lin for the Mandarin Service. Translated and written in English by Luisetta Mudie.

Link to original story on RFA website