What this means for hiring strategy
The Labour and Welfare Bureau released its 2023 Manpower Projection on 14 November 2024, estimating Hong Kong's overall manpower shortfall will widen from about 50,000 in 2023 to around 180,000 by 2028.
In 2023 manpower supply stood at about 3.50 million against demand of 3.55 million. By 2028, supply is projected at about 3.56 million against demand of 3.75 million.
Officials attribute the widening gap to an ageing workforce and slow labour force growth, and have signalled continued use of talent admission and imported labour schemes alongside productivity and training measures.
Our perspective
A structural shortage of this scale means employers cannot rely on replacement hiring alone. Competitive positioning on salary, flexibility, training and career pathways will increasingly decide who secures talent, especially for technical and specialist roles.
Our advice to HR partners
HR teams should map which of their critical roles fall into projected shortage categories, build succession and training pipelines now, and consider how government talent admission schemes can supplement local hiring where appropriate.
Where the shortage will bite hardest
The report covers seventeen selected industries spanning more than 2.8 million workers — around eighty per cent of Hong Kong's labour force and over seventy per cent of GDP. Skilled technical workers account for more than one third of the projected 2028 shortfall.
The projection assumes annual economic growth of around 3.2 per cent, while local labour supply grows only slightly to about 3.56 million. Employers should expect longer time-to-hire for scarce skills, more counter-offers, and greater reliance on retention, upskilling and imported talent schemes.
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