MR CHAN KIN-POR (in Cantonese): Thank you, President. Insurance is a risk management business; the better we can understand the nature of risks, the better we can set reasonable and accurate insurance premiums. There are a large number of private enterprises in the country and the key is how to better realize the risks involved. As pointed out in the main reply, ECIC is actively studying how it may have access to the credit information of companies in the Mainland, including strengthening the cooperation with relevant agencies like credit agencies and its Mainland counterparts. I agree that the direction is very right, but I wish to ask whether the Hong Kong Government has made use of its resources as far as possible to collect such information through organizations based in the Mainland, such as the Mainland offices of the Hong Kong Trade Development Council (“HKTDC”), or official organizations based in the Mainland?
SECRETARY FOR COMMERCE AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT (in Cantonese): President, regarding the supplementary question raised by Mr CHAN Kin-por, it has already been stated in my main reply that if more information is required in relation to risk assessment, ECIC will deal with it possibly through cooperation with Mainland organizations. As I have mentioned in my reply to Mr Sunny TAN’s question just now, ECIC and the relevant industries in the Mainland such as credit information agencies or Sinosure will become partnering organizations or even make use of so-called reinsurance. These are all feasible. However, under such a division of labour, if ECIC has to conduct professional risk assessment on individual cases on a self-sufficient basis, as I have mentioned earlier, it must rely on itself or members of the industry to do so in this regard.
As for Mr CHAN Kin-por’s query of how other government or related organizations can help in the Mainland, they can instead provide promotional services in general. In fact, we have also adopted a lot of flexible arrangements. For example, some subsidiaries of Hong Kong companies are located in the Mainland, but they can use the services of ECIC through their parent companies in Hong Kong. Or, as I have mentioned in the main reply earlier, many of our services which have been expanded and enhanced in recent years have made Hong Kong importers and exporters understand more about the services and benefits provided by ECIC. In this regard, HKTDC or our Mainland offices can help, but this is the aspect of business promotion. As for the aspect of professional services, I believe Mr CHAN will agree that we should leave it to ECIC or engage the relevant professional organizations to work on it together.