This was necessary as the New York Convention ceased to be applicable following the resumption of the exercise of sovereignty on 1 July 1997. We can now look forward to effective mutual enforcement of arbitral awards between Hong Kong and the rest of China. Apart from a sound legal framework giving appropriate and effective support, the various jurisdictions would need to ensure that they have high quality arbitrators and practitioners. We need to pay attention to continuing education and training and we must maintain high professional and ethical standards. In Hong Kong, we are fortunate to have various bodies, such as the Hong Kong International Arbitration Centre, the Hong Kong Institute of Arbitrators and the East Asia Branch of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators which are dedicated to and work hard for these objective.
Arbitration is of course a service industry.
Not only must one provide a good service, one needs to do so at reasonable cost. Any jurisdiction which allows costs to escalate will find that it is pricing itself out of the market. The various arbitration centres in Asia are of course in competition with each other. But with rapid economic development in Asia, the cake is an expanding one. We can share and learn from each other's experience so that we can improve ourselves.