What Cebu Can Learn from Hong Kong
We have visited Hong Kong a couple of weeks ago and could not help but make a comparison with Cebu. With what I have seen, I thought of things that Cebu can learn from this bustling big city.
Just like Cebu, it is not a food producing megapolis. Instead, it imports most of it from neighboring regions. It is also mostly hilly with limited flat lands and the only way to build is up with skyscrapers.
Unlike Cebu, they are able to manage their limited resources very well. It has a well planned drainage system and effective garbage collection and disposal. They have dated yet efficient mass transport network of trains and buses which are reliable and relatively on time. They have manageable vehicular traffic with well maintained roads, updated road signs and working traffic lights. Vehicle pollution is kept at bay. The infrastructure is top notch and inclusive. It is dense but an open park is available for everyone who wants to have stroll on a lazy afternoon. Expect clean public restrooms too. The airports and seaports are designed with the users convenience in mind and made orderly even with thousands of people using it at any given time.
However, I have noticed that the local residents are always busy and usually shy away from casual human interaction while working. Sometimes, this can be misconstrued as rude behaviour, but they are not, they are just hardworking people focused on what they are doing. There are Filipino workers that we have interacted with and they seem to have adapted well with Hong Kong’s fast paced life and getting used to dealing with locals and their indefatigable attitudes.
Yes, they have their fair share of issues and controversies relating to politics but they have maintained their standing as one of the leading economic powerhouse in Asia and still being visited by thousands of tourists daily. Its mixed service economy is working well despite the geophysical and political limitation. Perhaps, the British influence and other external factors made it what it is today; a city diverse enough to carve its own economic and social identify.
This is in no way an extensive scientific comparison but rather just based on my personal observation. I am writing this hoping we can learn something in managing a big city with limited resources such as ours. I believe Hong Kong can provide Cebu a lesson on effective and sustainable management of limited resource.
So what can we learn from Hong Kong then? Maybe we should learn to elect visionary leaders and do our part too as disciplined hardworking citizens.
– Jomark