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Following is the full text of the speech by the Chief Executive, Mr Tung Chee Hwa, at the Donation Ceremony for the Hong Kong Jockey Club Institute of Chinese Medicine this (June 26) afternoon:

Mr Li, Mr Wong, ladies and gentlemen,

I am pleased to be here with you today at the Donation Ceremony. It is encouraging to witness the setting up of the Institute of Chinese Medicine, which marks a significant milestone in the development of Chinese medicine.

The Hong Kong Jockey Club has always been actively engaged in a great many charitable causes. On behalf of the entire community of Hong Kong, I would like to thank the Jockey Club for its hard work over the years. While the charitable projects now in progress are all for the benefit of the community, its donation for the establishment of the Institute of Chinese Medicine is especially meaningful.

As I have pointed out in my Policy Address, Hong Kong will develop into a knowledge-based economy in the 21st century. We are faced with new challenges and opportunities brought about by the globalisation of economy, the rapid development of the Chinese economy as a result of the continuous reform and open-door policies of the Mainland, as well as the restructuring of Hong Kong's economy.

In response to these changes, our strategy is to steer Hong Kong's economy towards greater diversification. On the one hand, we must bolster the established pillars of our economy, such as the financial services sector, tourism and import and export trade. On the other hand, we must broaden the scope of our economic fundamentals, identify new economic drives for continuous economic growth, and create more job opportunities.

During the past three years, my Administration and I, together with dedicated members of the community, have been actively pushing ahead our development strategies as mentioned above. The Government is committed to creating a favourable environment to encourage and stimulate the development of innovation and technology. I am pleased to see that though much is still needed to be done, the efforts we made over the past three years have changed the mindset of more and more entrepreneurs and members of our community: from being sceptical at the early stage to being able to fully recognise today the importance of innovation and technology to the sustained economic growth of Hong Kong.

As I have also pointed out in my Policy Address, Hong Kong is benefited from its unique position and longstanding cooperation with the Mainland. These advantages, together with the well-established existing brand names and products of Chinese medicine in the field, will enable Hong Kong to develop traditional Chinese medicine into commercialised modern products through the application of innovation and technology and enjoy a share in the world market of medicine.

To achieve this goal, the SAR Government is committed to providing a favourable environment for entrepreneurial development in this area. We have enacted the Chinese Medicine Ordinance and will proceed with the registration of Chinese medical practitioners and Chinese medicine by stages. We also give support to researches in this field by injecting several hundred million Hong Kong dollars for the funding of a series of research programmes on Chinese medicine.

To further consolidate the foundation of research on Chinese medicine, we have decided to set up an Institute of Chinese Medicine under the Applied Science and Technology Institute, which is to be built shortly. I am delighted that the Hong Kong Jockey Club is in support of this idea and has donated HK$ 500 million for the establishment of the Institute. The Institute of Chinese Medicine will pool human and other resources together, coordinate various research projects for Chinese medicine, encourage entrepreneurs to work together with our universities to promote research and development of Chinese medicine, formulate long-term development strategies for the Chinese medicine industry, devise quality assessment of Chinese medicinal products and stimulate more efforts towards the commercialisation of Chinese medicine.

The development of Chinese medicine industry will depend ultimately on the investment from enterprises. It is most encouraging to note that since mid-1999, quite a number of local, mainland and overseas enterprises have shown interest in investing in the development of Chinese medicine in Hong Kong. I am glad to announce that several enterprises, including the Shanghai Industrial Holdings Ltd., the New World Development (China) Ltd. and the Hutchison Whampoa (China) Ltd., have already submitted to us their proposals on research and development of Chinese medicine in Hong Kong and that they are considering actively the setting up of business in the industrial estate for quality production of Chinese medicine on a larger scale. This shows that the enterprises share our vision that Hong Kong has the edge to develop Chinese medicine and that they are fully aware of the rich business potential of Chinese medicine in Hong Kong.

Hong Kong possesses the competitive edge for the development of Chinese medicine industry. Much efforts have been made by the enterprises in developing this new area of our economy. I am confident that with the integration of resources and strengths from the Government, the Hong Kong Jockey Club, enterprises and tertiary institutions, we will definitely gather greater momentum for achieving our goal of developing Hong Kong into an international centre for Chinese medicine, explore a new horizon for the development of Hong Kong's economy, attract more investment and create more job opportunities.

Thank you.

End/Monday, June 26, 2000

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