Hong Kong further extends scope of the BUD Fund to Kuwait and the UAE
The Trade and Industry Department (TID) further extended the geographical scope of the Dedicated Fund on Branding, Upgrading and Domestic Sales (BUD Fund) to Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates on 27June.
The BUD Fund provides funding support to individual Hong Kong enterprises in undertaking projects to develop brands, upgrade and restructure their business operations and promote sales in overseas markets to enhance their competitiveness and facilitate their business development.
The BUD Fund will reimburse 50% of total approved project costs, up to a cumulative funding ceiling of HKD6 million (c. USD750,000), and is open to all non-listed enterprises registered in Hong Kong under the Business Registration Ordinance (Chapter 310) with substantive business operations in Hong Kong.
Originally established in June 2012 to assist Hong Kong enterprises in exploring and developing the Mainland China market, the geographical coverage of the BUD Fund was first extended in August 2018 to include all the Association of Southeast Asian Nation (ASEAN) markets (comprising Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam).
Further expansions were implemented in January 2020 to cover 20 economies with which Hong Kong had signed Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) and, from July 2021, to all 37 economies with which Hong Kong has signed Investment Promotion and Protection Agreements (IPPAs).
“The enhancement launched will further support enterprises in making use of the better protection afforded by IPPAs to develop more diversified markets,” a spokesman of the TID said.
Besides Mainland China, the 10 ASEAN nations and the two newly added economies of Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, the other 24 economies currently covered under the BUD Fund are New Zealand, the four member states of the European Free Trade Association (Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland), Chile, Macao, Georgia, Australia, Japan, Korea, Austria, Belgium, Luxembourg, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, the Netherlands, Sweden and the UK.
