Macau Matters | Macau’s future economy

Richard Whitfield

I do not normally consider Macau’s economy directly in these pages, but I now think it is clear that Macau has built a strong economy based on “rest & relaxation” tourism, but that the age of the high roller is over and mass market tourism is the wave of the future that we must begin to ride more seriously.
This fundamental transition will continue some existing trends – greater tourist numbers and more hotels, restaurants and shopping malls – but will also require some fundamental shifts – more variety and more “family friendly” options.
We need more visitors (staying for longer) to get the same revenues from the mass market compared to high rollers, which must put more pressure on making it easier to get into and out of Macau and get around while people are here. Along these lines Zhuhai should also be encouraged to grow its tourism offering to add further variety and options. We also need the border between Macau and Zhuhai to “dissolve” as much as possible – more border crossings, open for longer and better cross-border transport links.
More mass market tourism with more “rest & relaxation” options means more people to serve them, which means really biting the bullet and opening up much more to foreign labour. It is ridiculous that a small, but vocal, segment of the community holds back the growth of Macau with complaints about protection for local jobs. Instead of restricting the entry of foreign labour these kinds of problem are much better resolved by greatly expanding social support services and support for retraining and other initiatives to help disadvantaged locals climb out of poverty.
We also cannot continue to put up with poor government planning and management of the development of Macau’s transport and other infrastructure. The extended delays in the Taipa ferry terminal, the light rail system and numerous other examples clearly demonstrate incompetence that is being rooted out, but far too slowly. We pay world class salaries to our civil servants and we must demand competence from them, and demand it sooner rather than later.
Personally, I am really looking forward to much more entertainment variety in the future in Macau – more shows and exhibitions and theatre and more music and more varied restaurants. However, this will rely on bringing in performers and other experts on relatively short stay work permits. We cannot develop unless these work permits are easy to obtain. We also need many more performance spaces, most of which should be relatively small and flexible – 10 by 1,000 seat, flexible venues will be much more valuable and useful than one 10,000 seat space.
In the longer term, we need to capitalize on and localize this entertainment expertise. I really cannot understand why none of the Macau universities have opened an academy for performing arts to train performers and technical support staff. (I have seen that the University of Macau has a black box theatre, but it does not seem to do much.) I tried to do this some years ago and even had some initial talks with about possible collaborations with carious potential partners but there was not enough interest in Macau. Maybe local schools could also consider broadening their performing arts emphasis beyond school choirs and orchestras to start stimulating demand.
Macau is a great place with a strong and clear future, but we really do need to proactively work to make this potential future a reality. Personally, I have no interest in seeing Macau slide back to being the backwater it was 20 years ago. Working together we can ensure that this does not happen.