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Changing pattern of industrial location. Intra-urban migration. Dispersion to new industrial suburbs. What makes industries necessary to disperse to suburban location? What types of industries are found in suburbs? Why? What benefits are brought to suburbs?
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Changing pattern of industrial location Intra-urban migration
Dispersion to new industrial suburbs • What makes industries necessary to disperse to suburban location? • What types of industries are found in suburbs? Why? • What benefits are brought to suburbs? • Will new industrial suburbs create problems? • How to make it under control?
Industrial decentralization in Hong Kong • Late 70s – 80s from urban HK to new towns • New town development vs industrialization • 90s from HK to South China
Efficient transport network / linkages with urban areas • Usually at junctions of highways / along railway lines / port locations • Tolo Harbour Highway Tai Po Industrial Estate / Science Park / Fo Tan • Tuen Mun Highway Industrial areas in Tuen Mun / Tsuen Wan • Tate’s Cairn Tunnel Highway Shek Mun Industrial district
Part of new town development programme (institutional factors) • Tai Po / Yuen Long / Tseung Wan O Industrial Estates • Industrial land uses in Fanling / Sheung Shui (mainly for storage) • Tsuen Wan (Textile / bleaching / dyeing factories in 50s – 80s • Tuen Mun (Food processing / bus depot)
Environmental considerations • Noxious industries, e.g. oil depots / power plants / storage of dangerous goods • Recycling park / ecopark in Tuen Mun • Cement works / oil depots in Tsing Yi • Incinerators in Kwai Chung / Kennedy Town / Lai Chi Kok in 60s – 70s
Impact of out-of-town industrial development on land use pattern • More obvious functional segregation of land uses • Reduction of mixed land uses • Urban redevelopment
Conflicting interests of society • Environmentalists • Ecologists • Recreationists • Economists • Town people • Local people
CLP’s intention to construct a liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal on the South Soko Island.
Regional dispersion of industries Agglomeration diseconomies
What are diseconomies? • Disadvantages of a firm’s operation because such concentration leads to an increasing cost of production
Industrial decentralization • What are the factors leading to industrial deglomeration? • Physical / economic / social / political • What are the risks of such relocation? • What can the industrialists do to minimize the risks?
Go West Policy • Refer to the PowerPoint
Is it true that industrial relocation doesn’t occur despite diseconomies of scale? • Yes / no? • Firms or particular groups of industries tend to remain in an existing location (non-optimal sites) after the original factors for their location have weakened or disappeared. The locations were more favourable in the past than they are now. • INDUSTRIAL INERTIA
Industrial inertia • What benefits can the industrialists enjoy at present locations? • What possible problems may the industrialists encounter in new locations? • What are the effects of inertia on firms which do not relocate? • How can these firms survive despite diseconomies of scale?
Benefits • Physical infrastructure, e.g. roads, water and electricity supplies, are present. • Ancillary services are available. • A pool of skilled labour is available. • The firms need to be near to existing market. • The firms need to maintain existing linkages with other firms (with long established business relations)
Problems • At the new sites, personal ties and linkages with the original industrial network may break down. • At the new locations, the cost and time of training new labour are needed. • There are risks and uncertainties in the new production environments. Knowledge about new regions is not so perfect. • There are diseconomies of disinvestment, e.g. high cost will be involved in moving bulky capital equipment.
How can these firms survive despite diseconomies of scale? • contraction of business • downsizing the workforce • closure of inefficient plants • restructuring by adaptation of existing industries in situ, introducing more efficient production methods • developing new industries/new products • movement towards specialization of products
Industrial cycle • Industrialization de-industrialization (decline) development of new industries re-industrialization (industrial rejuvenation)