The idea of a Five-Year Plan for Hong Kong may be shocking at first sight. Here one of Hong Kong’s leading political economists explains why the Chinese model of five-year guidelines is distant from its obsolete Soviet prototype, and why it could be a good thing for Hong Kong to develop long-term policy, more closely aligned with national objectives than its current one-year model embedded in the Chief Executive’s policy address. This article represent’s Professor Wang’s views, not those of the Chamber. 

Hong Kong is flirting with a mainland-style Five-Year Plan. On paper, that signals intent and discipline. Moreover, it is a welcome course correction – and one that should have come years ago. 

In practice, it raises the hardest question of all. Can a city that has long prided itself on light-touch governance and market reflexes execute a whole-of-society planning process without the institutional muscle, the technical bench, or the political habit of doing so?

Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee has set the tone. In February, he said he would lead a task force to craft the city’s inaugural five-year development blueprint, aligned with Beijing’s 15th Five-Year Plan (2026–30). On March 5, he attended the opening ceremony of the annual session of China’s parliament known as the National People’s Congress, which was set to approve the outline of the 15th Five-Year Plan. He told reporters that his government would map out strategic initiatives for key development areas, and draw up “a macroscopic, strategic and forward-looking” five-year plan for the city. 

Lee said that he instructed all government bureaus to set up preparatory groups and commence preparation work. These preparatory groups would be converted into formulation teams for the alignment with the 15th Five-Year Plan and work at full speed to complete the Hong Kong five-year plan within this year. 

The plan will outline Hong Kong’s development vision, core objectives, key areas and major initiatives for the coming five years, providing a clear roadmap and timetable for Hong Kong’s social, economic and livelihood development, to facilitate Hong Kong’s integration and support for national development.

The pivot is long overdue. This is exactly the kind of medium-to-long-term strategic thinking Hong Kong has needed for years – and  it is a move I have been advocating since late 2022.

Hong Kong’s governing rhythm has long been annual and tactical. Policy Addresses are heavy on one-year deliverables and light on the medium-to-long-term choices needed to tackle structural problems like housing and widening inequality. Even when new growth ideas appear – gold trading, bulk commodities, metal warehousing, the low‑altitude economy – there are rarely roadmaps or timetables attached.

The case for a longer horizon is straightforward. A well-crafted Hong Kong Five-Year Plan would allow Hong Kong to integrate more effectively into national strategies, articulate its unique strengths (and needs) during the national planning process itself, and finally move beyond one-year horizons to tackle long-standing problems head-on. It could also send a powerful message to the international community that Hong Kong is thinking strategically about its future under “one country, two systems.”

In an article explaining the importance of China’s Five-Year Plan, the Economist magazine once compared the plan to the election manifestos put forward by Western political parties during each electoral cycle – outlining their political propositions and setting out short, medium, and long‑term economic development goals and tasks to win support from party members and voters.

A Hong Kong Five-Year Plan – Really? 

But the ideological hang‑ups were real. For years, “Five‑Year Plan” sounded to many in Hong Kong like a planned‑economy relic and a step toward full incorporation into mainland frameworks, which more likely would force the city to lose its distinct identity. 

That fear, and the instinctive response of some in the business elite – “This is Hong Kong. We don’t do Five‑Year Plans” – kept the conversation off‑limits. It is to the current government’s credit that the taboo has been broken.

Today’s mainland Five-Year Plan is vastly different from the 1950s originals.

China’s first Five‑Year Plan was launched shortly after the founding of the People’s Republic, in 1953. It was a literal emulation of the Soviet Union’s Five‑Year Plans, formulating long‑term plans for national economic and social development, with each plan covering a five‑year period. The first Five‑Year Plan was drafted with the assistance of Soviet experts, setting detailed output quotas and indicators for every industry and product – from large aircraft to small bars of soap, all with precise specifications and production targets, representing the most salient features of a planned economy.

In the late 1970s, the Chinese mainland began its reform and opening‑up. The planned economic system gradually transitioned to a planned market economy, with the government’s direct allocation of resources diminishing. The nature, scope, and formulation process of the Five‑Year Plan also underwent profound changes.

Starting in 2006, at the beginning of the 11th Five‑Year Plan (2006-2010), the term “Five‑Year Plan” was renamed “Five‑Year Guidelines” in Chinese. Although only one character differs in Chinese, this change signaled that the guideline had begun to shed the vestiges of the planned economy, introducing more guiding than prescriptive elements. Indicators were also divided into anticipatory and binding measures, and the process became more systematic, scientific and legal.

Today, the formulation process brings together the wisdom and strength of the entire government and society, with officials from the central to local levels, enterprises, and scholars all participating.

China’s Five-Year Plans are not just documents; they are a governance process. They mobilize ministries, provinces, state-owned enterprises (SOEs), policy banks, universities, think tanks, industry bodies, and mass organizations into a years-long, iterative effort to set targets, reconcile trade-offs, assign budgets, and enforce accountability down the chain. Targets cascade into sectoral and local plans; data systems track implementation; personnel incentives are tied to delivery.

President Xi Jinping personally served as the head of the drafting groups for the Recommendations of the 13th and 14th Five‑Year Plans, according to official media reports. 

What will it take to deliver?

Formulating a Five‑Year Plan typically involves ten steps and takes nearly three years. Research usually begins in the middle of the ongoing Five‑Year Plan. The first step is a mid‑term evaluation of the current guideline, followed by preliminary research for the new plan, formation of the basic ideas, drafting of the Recommendations of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, adoption of the Recommendations at the Fifth Plenary Session, drafting of the initial version of the plan in outline, solicitation of public suggestions, coordination and verification, collection of opinions, and final approval and release. 

Preliminary research for the 14th Five‑Year Guideline started as early as the end of 2019, when the central government commissioned more than 60 think tanks and research institutions to conduct studies on 37 major topics, which then produced over 130 reports for reference of leaders.

The mainland’s advantage is not ideology so much as scale and capacity. There is a dense ecosystem of planners, statisticians, engineers, and policy researchers accustomed to this choreography. There are established mechanisms to gather input, adjudicate conflicts, and move resources quickly once the plan is set.

Hong Kong lacks most of that. Its civil service is competent but thinly staffed in strategic planning and policy evaluation. The city’s policy research ecosystem is fragmented, with few independent institutes that do rigorous long-horizon modeling. 

Data infrastructure is patchy and siloed. The talent pipeline has been stretched by emigration, sectoral churn, and a persistent gap in STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) and public-policy skills. And the city’s governance tradition has been to regulate and enable rather than to plan and drive.

That creates at least four structural hurdles.

Process design. A credible Five-Year Plan requires a transparent, iterative process: scoping, consultation, modeling, costing, prioritization, and monitoring. Hong Kong will need to establish a central planning unit with teeth, build shared data standards across departments, and create an external expert network that can challenge assumptions and quantify trade-offs. Without that, the plan risks becoming a wish list stitched together by bureaus.

Capacity and expertise. The mainland can tap cadres, SOE technocrats, university labs, and think tanks with deep sectoral knowledge. Hong Kong will have to build or borrow that capacity – through talent schemes, secondments, and partnerships with mainland planning bodies – while upgrading its own statistical, forecasting, and program-evaluation capabilities.

Whole-of-society engagement. Beijing’s planning process pulls in business chambers, industry associations, unions, rural collectives, and mass organizations. Hong Kong’s civil society is smaller and more wary. If engagement is perfunctory, the plan will miss critical information and lose buy-in; if it is genuine, it will be slower and more politically demanding than the government is used to.

Execution and accountability. Mainland plans are backed by budgetary alignment, cadre evaluations, and policy-bank finance. Hong Kong will need to hardwire its plan to the budget, set measurable outcomes with timelines, publish dashboards, and accept external scrutiny. Otherwise, slogans will outpace delivery.

None of this argues against planning. In a slow-growth, high-competition environment, Hong Kong needs a clearer sense of direction and a mechanism to coordinate across housing, land, logistics, innovation, talent, services exports, and integration with the Greater Bay Area. But clarity requires hard choices: sequencing megaprojects, and focusing on a few comparative advantages rather than trying to be everything to everyone. 

Can Hong Kong do it?

What it would take for Hong Kong to pull this off?

First, the Chief Executive must personally take charge and lead the entire formulation process. It is gratifying to hear that Lee said he would take the reins. 

Starting from preliminary research on major issues, government bureaus and departments, think tanks, universities, and especially financial and business leaders and entrepreneurs should be mobilized to participate extensively in discussions. In particular, the views and suggestions of foreign-funded businesses and chambers in Hong Kong should be carefully heeded. 

Finally, wisdom should be pooled to launch implementable KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) that can be broken down layer by layer and year by year across government departments. For example, the housing dilemma that has plagued Hong Kong for decades has been addressed by successive governments only from the narrow perspective of land and housing. 

In reality, the widespread problems of cage homes and subdivided flats are major social issues stemming from Hong Kong’s extreme wealth gap and inadequate social security. They cannot be resolved without the participation of the whole society.

Even then, the politics of prioritization will be difficult. A real plan creates winners and losers in time and money. It should narrow the field of “strategic industries” and should be prepared to be as serious about killing weak projects as it is about launching new ones.

Done right, a five‑year plan could help Hong Kong integrate more intelligently into national development, tighten delivery discipline, and rebuild confidence at home and abroad. It could also reset expectations by turning lofty aspirations into budget‑backed missions with timelines.

Done poorly, it could devolve into a wish list stitched together by departments, heavy on slogans and light on execution – a risk heightened by today’s thin bench of planners and evaluators.

Which brings us back to the big question. Mainland planning works because it is an ecosystem – a years‑long, whole‑of‑society process with dense expertise and clear lines of accountability. Hong Kong is starting without that ecosystem. It can build it, adapt it, and make it fit the city’s scale and character. But with ambition high and capacity thin, whether Hong Kong can truly pull off a Five‑Year Plan – process and all – remains a very large question mark.

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