Second, instruments are needed that enable early detection of potential slippage in revenue and expenditure during the fiscal year. The new Stability Law demands significant improvements in the transparency of general government conduct, particularly in relation to the budget outturn figures for regional and local government, which should be released with the same periodicity, degree of detail, lag and ready accessibility as central government data. Third, the mechanisms enabling the prompt correction of any potential slippage must be reinforced. Once again, the Stability Law includes new instruments, such as the automatic adjustment of regional government spending in specific cases of non-compliance, the possibility of establishing sanctions and also of central government imposing adjustment measures. These new provisions may be effective in ensuring discipline, a matter that is all the more important following the extraordinary measures adopted by the State to offer liquidity support to regional and local government, such funds being conditional upon compliance with adjustment plans. And, fourth, the reinforcement of the credibility of the fiscal consolidation process takes on great importance in the current situation of the sovereign debt crisis. It may be of help here to establish a medium-term budgetary horizon providing sufficient details of the expected trend of public revenue and spending and the assumptions on which they are based, and on the contents of the planned measures and the expected effect they will have. That would all contribute to reducing economic agents’ uncertainty and would help identify the problems ahead in the medium term.

Such investments can be found in the emerging markets of Asia, especially in China. Although the dynamics are somewhat different in China, its tale of economic growth is as legendary as that of the Middle East. China has experienced a huge inflow of funds in search of growth opportunities and at the same time the Mainland authorities have been gradually opening up the country’s outward investment. As a Special Administrative Region of China, Hong Kong plays a pivotal role as the IFC of China in the course of financial liberalisation. Not only has it acted as a conduit for Mainland companies accessing international markets through IPOs, but also one of the largest sources of foreign direct investments for Mainland China. With the continuing financial liberalisation on the Mainland, Hong Kong is positioned as the most attractive destination both for investing into China and tapping China's funds. What are the challenges for us? Opportunities aside, we are of course aware that Hong Kong also faces challenges in developing Islamic finance. It is a fact that Hong Kong’s Islamic community is not big, but we are confident that the development of Shariah-compliant financial markets can take off even in environments in which the domestic Islamic community is relatively small, simply for the fact that investors nowadays are looking beyond domestic boundaries and traditional finances as financial activities gravitate towards the Middle East and China. Indeed Hong Kong’s relatively small population does not seem to undermine in any way our performance in the conventional financial and capital markets.