Working in GBA? Find out for yourself
The Student Exchange Network of the Hong Kong United Youth Association on Tuesday released the results of a survey on how interested Hong Kong youths are in seeking career opportunities on the mainland, especially in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area. The survey, conducted in February and March, found more than 90 percent of respondents were optimistic about the outlook of the country’s economic development and more than 80 percent expressed willingness to work on the mainland. Nearly 75 percent of respondents want to find work on the mainland because they see more opportunities there. The survey sent questionnaires to Hong Kong college students and 465 of them responded.
It is no secret that the number of Hong Kong college students pursuing internships on the mainland each year has grown in recent years; therefore people should not be surprised at all by positive replies to such surveys from the majority of respondents. One doesn’t have to be a genius to understand why, either: The respondents’ optimism toward the future of the national economy explains their interest in working on the mainland perfectly. Their internship on the mainland would also prove a valuable experience in preparing them to seek employment up north after graduation. Hence over 80 percent of respondents believed mainland internships would give them the confidence, as well as first-hand knowledge of actually working there, to consider employment for an extended period of time, maybe a year or a little longer, just to see how it goes.
One can safely assume Hong Kong college students are generally welcome to pursue internships on the mainland; otherwise the respondents would not have had enough confidence in taking a step further after graduation. Let’s not forget there are far more mainland college graduates competing for jobs every year than their Hong Kong counterparts and most of them are also hard-working, too. That means no Hong Kong student should miss out on mainland internship however nervous they might feel about it. One can never be sure of oneself in anything until one tries it for real. After all, an internship is not a lifethreatening stunt or any other crazy venture but a taste of what to expect if one decides to apply for a job on the mainland. This is by no means a promise for a rewarding internship, but what do you have to lose in such an experience?
The survey results show that most of our younger generation are not anti-mainland as the opposition politicians would like to present them to be. They do know about the prodigious progress the country has made in economic and other developments and they are eager to experience it firsthand. They know their career prospects would vastly broaden should they muster enough courage and determination to seek their opportunities within the much greater framework of national development. Our young people see great prospects on the mainland and we see hope in them.