Hong Kong-Singapore
A new race
These two traditional rivals now in a new race in which Seoul is falling behind. Chosun Ilbo.
Jan 23, 2008

By Song Eui-dal
Singapore and Hong Kong are inveterate rivals. If Hong Kong claims to be the main gate to the Chinese market and the hub of Asia, then Singapore contends that it is the ideal gateway to India and the Middle East.

They engage in psychological warfare to get high marks in corporate and management environment index surveys conducted every year by the World Economic Forum and the Heritage Foundation.

These two regions have recently started a fresh round of competition - a "brain gain" race, or a bid to lure talented foreign professionals.

The Hong Kong government took the lead by setting forth a programme called the Quality Migrant Admission Scheme (QMAS) in June 2006, targeting high-profile professionals, scientists and artists from all over the world.

Some 322 people, including world-renowned pianists Li Yundi and Lang Lang and actress Zhang Ziyi, have already finished procedures to become permanent residents of Hong Kong. About 600 others are currently under immigration review.

Then in May last year, Singapore announced that it would more than double its number of talented foreign professionals and students in five years.

Since last month Singapore has been issuing six-month work visas for college students and college graduates between 17 and 30 from eight advanced countries, including the U.S., Britain, Japan and Germany.

These foreign students are permitted to choose any profession and there is no ceiling on their wages under the Singaporean government's plan to encourage them to live and work there for a long time.

Of its total population of 4.5m, there are already one million foreign residents in Singapore. The proportion of foreign students at the city-state's three most prestigious universities, including the National University of Singapore, has reached 22 percent.

Nonetheless, Singaporean intellectuals are of the opinion that their country's fate depends on how successful they can be in luring talented foreign professionals.

Singapore's Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew says he spearheaded Singapore's brain gain campaign. "If Singapore is a computer hard disk drive, then talented foreign professionals can play a role in boosting the disk drive's capacity by millions of bytes," Lee said.

Stunned by this "counterattack" from Singapore, Hong Kong last Friday decided to remove the age limit of 50 set for the QMAS and issue special visas for foreign students so that they can stay in Hong Kong a year after graduation.

In cooperation with the Hong Kong government, the University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, and the Chinese University of Hong Kong has offered talented students unprecedented incentive programs, including scholarships of up to HK$92,000 (approximately Won11 million, US$1=Won949) per year, as well as a four-year exemption of tuition fees.

This is aimed at attracting the attention of talented students from mainland China to universities in Hong Kong, and away from Chinese universities such as Peking University and Tsinghua University.

Singapore and Hong Kong are not the only regions that are trying to lure talented foreign students and professionals.

The US government recently spent US$1 million airing TV ads to lure Indian and Chinese students to study in the US Despite its strong antipathy toward foreign workers, the European Union decided to issue residence permits which can be renewed every two years to talented foreign professionals

China's Ministry of Education launched a so-called "111" programme in September 2006, aiming to invite 1,000 world class academics from the world's top 100 universities to establish 100 innovative research bases in China.

South Korea is swimming against the current of the times, paying no heed to this global brain gain race.

In the 1995 Brain Drain Index published by the International Institute for Management Development in Switzerland, South Korea scored 7.53, where a score closer to 10 indicates less danger of brain drain.

This placed South Korea fourth in the world behind the US, Norway and France. However, in 2006 South Korea's score fell to 4.91, ranking it 38th among 58 nations in the world.

The incoming administration is giving priority to advancement to move beyond industrialization and democratization.

But it will be difficult for the country to maintain even its present status, let alone join the club of advanced countries, if talented South Korean professionals are continuously leaving for foreign countries and talented foreigners are averting their eyes from South Korea.

(This column was contributed by Song Eui-dal, the Chosun Ilbo's correspondent in Hong Kong.)

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