Hong Kong-mainland border: reopening will be a welcome boost to lives and livelihoods, but challenges remain

Even a limited reopening between Hong Kong and Guangdong next month will be a relief for struggling businesses and cross-border families
Privacy concerns aside, officials should also consider the practical challenges faced by the elderly in using health code apps on smartphones

Ken Chu

Published: 6:45am, 10 Nov 2021

Why you can trust SCMP

Hong Kong has been in talks with the central government in an attempt to fully open the border with the mainland, which has been practically closed with strict mandatory quarantine measures since the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Only limited groups of people have been able to enter Hong Kong. These included, until November 12, senior financial executives, whose presence was deemed to be in the interests of Hong Kong’s economy, as well as Hong Kong and non-Hong Kong residents eligible for the Return2HK and Come2HK travel schemes respectively.

This has caused tremendous stress among members of the business community and local residents who have businesses or family ties on the mainland.

If you are an ordinary salaried worker, you could potentially risk losing your job if you have to undergo a lengthy quarantine period both on entering the mainland and returning to Hong Kong because you want to visit your family across the border. Now, there seems to be a light at the end of the tunnel.

The State Council’s Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office has reportedly expressed optimism about reopening the border. A spokesman was recently quoted as saying that “both sides [China and Hong Kong] met each other halfway and the full reopening of the border is progressing in an orderly manner”.

06:05

As more countries ditch ‘zero-Covid’ policy, why is China opting to ‘wait and see’?

Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor has also said the reopening could be gradual. However, according to local media reports, while there will be quarantine-free travel, it will initially be limited to between Hong Kong and Guangdong, with Shenzhen serving as the key border point.

There have been reports that such quarantine-free travel could start as early as mid-December, with mainland China reopening fully to quarantine-free travel by June at the latest.

That would be a great Christmas gift for Hong Kong and would provide a much-needed boost to the local economy.

Restaurants, hotels, and travel- and transport-related businesses are expected to benefit. Furthermore, reopening the border will help relieve the psychological distress of people with family members on both sides of the divide.

Although the initial phase would only cover travel to Guangdong, this would still be a huge relief to many of the more than 550,000 Hong Kong residents who usually reside in the mainland province, according to Census and Statistics Department data.

02:11

Guangzhou tightens Covid-19 controls as mass tests expose more cases in Chinese city

Designating Shenzhen as the only entry point is sensible, given that Shenzhen and Hong Kong have long been considered twin cities separated only a river, and there are now seven road-based border checkpoints for residents of both cities to access easily.

Lam has also mentioned that Hong Kong residents entering the mainland would most likely have to use a contact-tracing app or health code. This has been described as a critical requirement set by mainland authorities for permitting quarantine-free border travel on both sides.

That should be feasible. There are unlikely to be drastic technical modifications needed to align our home-grown Leave Home Safe contact-tracing app with the mainland’s health code system. However, there are still several concerns for the government to address.

Privacy issues aside, officials should consider the practical technological challenges faced by elderly people if using a smartphone and an app is the only way to satisfy the mainland’s health coding requirements.

03:25

How Hong Kong’s new coronavirus contact-tracing app works

On the mainland, elderly citizens often have the option of going through special assistance lanes where their ID cards can be scanned for health code information. Perhaps a similar mechanism can be extended to retired people who live in Guangdong but have family ties in Hong Kong. Otherwise, they might not benefit from the border reopening.

The governments on both sides of the border have made great strides in controlling the pandemic, in the face of highly contagious Covid-19 variants. With all systems in place, a gradual approach is the best way to ensure a smooth full border reopening, which will be great news for people’s lives and livelihoods. Let’s keep our fingers crossed.

Ken Chu is group chairman and CEO of Mission Hills Group and a national committee member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference

Post