News

Information from the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC) indicated that the average daily wage of construction workers was MOP726 in the first quarter of 2015, rising at a slower pace of 1.8% quarter-to-quarter due to less intense activity for some major construction projects in Cotai nearing completion. The average daily wage of local construction workers decreased by 2.1% to MOP935, while that of non-resident construction workers rose slightly by 1.2% to MOP614. The average daily wage of skilled & semi-skilled workers was MOP731, up by 1.7% quarter-to-quarter. The average daily wages of structural iron erectors (MOP935) and plumbers (MOP719) increased by 17.0% and 9.8% respectively. However, the average daily wages of electricians and electrical workers (MOP738) and air-conditioning mechanics (MOP738) decreased by 2.5% and 3.3%. Meanwhile, the average daily wage of unskilled workers was MOP393, up by 1.3%. The real wage index of construction workers and local construction workers registered slower growth or decrease in the first quarter of 2015, following the respective quarter-to-quarter surge of 4.3% and 6.2% in the fourth quarter of 2014. In the first quarter of 2015, the wage index of construction workers (98.4) rose modestly by 0.3% quarter-to-quarter in real terms; meanwhile, the wage index of local construction workers decreased by 5.3% to 122.5, slightly higher than the index (121.7) in the third quarter of 2014. As regards construction materials, the average price of concrete increased by 6.4% quarter-to-quarter, at MOP745 per cubic metre in the first quarter of 2015; the average price of spiral & round reinforcing steel bars was MOP4,687 per tonne, down by 1.8%. Meanwhile, the price index of construction materials for residential buildings (131.4) in the first quarter of 2015 increased by 1.3% quarter-to-quarter.
…

Consumer Council conducted its first and second ‘Supermarket price survey’ in May on 4 and 5 May respectively for the implementation of Section 2b), Article 10, Law 4/95/M of 12 June. Surveyed locations included over 20 supermarkets near Areia Preta , Avenida de Venceslau de Morais, Toi San, Ilha Verde and Fai Chi Kei areas in N. Sra. de Fátima Parish. The latest ‘Supermarket Price Survey’ is now available on Consumer Council’s website (www.consumer.gov.mo), ‘Supermarket Price Information Platform’ iPhone and Android apps, and on the Council’s WeChat account page. The survey is also available free of charge at the offices of Consumer Council, IACM’s Iao Hon and S. Domingos Markets, bookstores and libraries. Consumers may also access the resources through WAP channels on their mobile phones. With reference to the local six parishes and the number of supermarkets in each parish, the Council has divided around 100 supermarkets into 8 areas for price collection. The Council collects prices from these supermarkets for the provision of a more comprehensive database for consumers to check price discrepancies and make price comparisons according to their desired locations. For inquiry, please call 8988 9315.
…

Mr. Jackson Chang, President of Macao Trade and Investment Promotion Institute (IPIM) has been invited as Advisor to the Asian Federation of Exhibition & Convention Associations (AFECA) in 2013 and attended AFECA´s Advisory Council Meeting on April 28-30 in Seoul, at the invitation of the said organization. AFECA was founded in 2005 at the initiative of the convention and exhibition associations of some of the Asian cities, regions and countries, namely, China, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and etc., being a non-government organization aiming to build a cooperation and exchange platform for the convention and exhibition industry in Asia, focusing on education and training, promotion of exchanges and cooperation among its members and to push for the sustainable development of Asia´s MICE industry. Macao Convention & Exhibition Association (MCEA) is a member of AFECA. Mr. Jackson Chang, President of IPIM, participated in the above-mentioned activity to exchange opinion with the leaders and elites of the convention and exhibition industry in Asia, and also took the opportunity to introduce the advantages of Macao as a convention and exhibition destination, as well as the “One-Stop-Service” for MICE Bidding and Support in Macao provided by IPIM. At the meeting, AFECA´s President, Mr. Walter Yeh announced that the first edition of AEC Plus MICE Expo, organized by AFECA, would take place in Kuala Lumpur, in November this year. Concurrent event will include a “Youth Enterprise Development Workshop”. Besides, Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) will also organize an “Asian MICE Forum” in September this year, which will include, as a concurrent event, the “Asian MICE Young Generation Forum”. Mr. Jackson Chang, President of IPIM, said that the above activities bring together Asia´s MICE industry and will benefit and enhance contacts and communication. Besides, we could avail of these opportunities to promote the advantages of Macao´s conventions and exhibitions, and stimulate cooperation and exchange among Macao and Asia´s young entrepreneurs. IPIM will actively study the possibility of organizing delegations to participate in these events, he said. President Chang also stressed Macao Government´s active participation in regional cooperation, in line with the “One Belt, One Road” national policy, by strengthening trade and economic cooperation with the ASEAN member states.
…

Lei Cheok Wai, a Cultural Affairs Bureau grantee in the U.S., got the first prize in the 2013 “BomBom” Music Video Contest, organised by American hiphop singers Macklemore and Ryan Lewis who sang the tune “BomBom”. This distinction is indeed an honour to Macao. Recently, with his directorial commercial entitled Anti-Smoking PSA, Lei Cheok Wai has won awards in the U.S., namely, the Commercial 3rd Place at the 36th College Television Awards (Emmy Awards), the Bronze Award (Student Category) at the 2015 American Advertising Awards-Los Angeles—known as the ADDY awards, and also the Silver Award (Student Category) at the 2015 American Advertising Awards-California—the next level of the ADDY awards. The Emmy Awards ceremony took place on 23 April (U.S. time) in Hollywood and Lei’s commercial Anti-Smoking PSA, stood out from over 400 entries and was awarded the 3rd Place at the College Television Awards (Emmy Awards). The Emmy Awards recognise excellent TV production in various sectors of the American television industry throughout the year. Recently, the same commercial won the Bronze Award (Student Category) at the 2015 American Advertising Awards-Los Angeles, standing out amid several hundreds of student entries and also won the Silver Award (Student Category) at the 2015 American Advertising Awards-California. Anti-Smoking PSA is now competing at the national level of ADDY awards, which is the largest and most representative competition of the U.S. advertising industry, with the mission to recognise and reward, on an annual basis, the most creative and excellent advertisements. The piece has also been selected to compete at the Association of Independent Commercial Producers (AICP) Awards. Furthermore, the MTV Won't Get Away directed by Lei for American singer Phil Beaudreau, has been shortlisted for the National Film Festival for Talented Youth (NFFTY). Anti-Smoking PSA is a black-and-white commercial, featuring a young model smoking a cigaret. As the hands of the clock behind her tickle, the model puffs and wrinkles grow all over her face, with a black hole appearing on her clavicle, dramatically showing the harms of smoking. Lei Cheok Wai is one of the IC grantees studying abroad. Having just graduated with a BA degree from the Film Programme of the Art Center College of Design in California, Lei currently works as a commercial director and MTV producer, hoping to involve in the film industry in future. Lei says, “Winning the awards is only a good start, as there’s still a long way to go and lots of room to improve.” He wishes to become an honour of Chinese people some day.
…

According to statistics released today by the Monetary Authority of Macao, money supply continued to drop in March. As total loans increased whereas total deposits dropped, the overall loan-to-deposit ratio of the banking sector rose from a month earlier. Money supply Currency in circulation dropped 5.7% whereas demand deposits grew 0.7%. M1 thus decreased 0.6% from one month earlier. Concurrently, quasi-monetary liabilities dropped 0.9%. The sum of these two items, i.e. M2, decreased 0.8% to MOP477.6 billion. On an annual basis, M1 and M2 rose 5.4% and 4.9% respectively. The share of Pataca (MOP) in M2 stood at 27.5%, down 0.1 percentage point from a month ago but up 2.9 percentage points from a year earlier. The share of Hong Kong Dollar (HKD) in M2 was 49.8%, down 0.4 percentage points month-to-month but up 0.1 percentage point year-on-year. The share of Chinese Yuan (CNY) was 11.9%, kept virtually stable month-to-month but down 4.7 percentage points year-on-year. The share of United States Dollar (USD) was 8.5%, up 0.4 percentage points month-to-month or 1.7 percentage points year-on-year. Deposits Resident deposits decreased 0.7% from the preceding month to MOP466.2 billion. Of which, MOP, HKD and CNY deposits decreased at respective rates of 0.6%, 1.7% and 0.6% while USD and other foreign currency deposits increased 4.0% and 0.8% respectively. Non-resident deposits dropped 3.4% to MOP236.5 billion. Public sector deposits with the banking sector increased 7.2% to MOP113.4 billion. As a result, total deposits with the banking sector dropped 0.5% from a month earlier to MOP816.1 billion. The shares of MOP, HKD, CNY and USD in total deposits were 19.7%, 41.4%, 13.7% and 20.6% respectively. Loans Domestic loans to the private sector increased 2.3% from a month ago to MOP354.2 billion. Among which, MOP95.2 billion was MOP-denominated, MOP233.8 billion was denominated in HKD, MOP1.9 billion was denominated in CNY and MOP21.8 billion was denominated in USD, representing 26.9%, 66.0%, 0.5% and 6.2% of the total respectively. Analysed by economic sector, “information technology”, “education” and “restaurants, hotels and similar” increased at respective rates of 29.3%, 21.1% and 16.7% compared with a quarter ago, whereas “non-monetary financial institutions” and “electricity, gas and water” dropped 54.4% and 7.1% respectively. External loans dropped marginally by 0.1% to MOP354.6 billion; of which, loans denominated in MOP, HKD, CNY and USD accounted for 1.3% (MOP4.6 billion), 21.0% (MOP74.5 billion), 17.4% (MOP61.7 billion) and 55.3% (MOP196.1 billion) respectively. Loan-to-deposit ratios The loan-to-deposit ratio for the resident sector at end-March rose 0.9 percentage points from the previous month to 61.1%. The ratio for both the resident and non-resident sectors also grew by 1.3 percentage points to 86.9%.
…

Information from the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC) indicated that a total of 1,455 new companies were incorporated in the first quarter of 2015, an increase of 329 year-on-year; total value of registered capital decreased by 17.8% to MOP157 million. Analysed by industry, the majority of new incorporations were operating in Wholesale & Retail (563) and Business Services (324). Companies in dissolution totalled 158, up by 3 year-on-year; value of registered capital of companies in dissolution decreased by 8.8% to MOP26 million. Analysed by size of registered capital, there were 1,061 new companies registered with capital under MOP50,000 (72.9% of total), and the total value of capital was MOP28 million (17.7% of total); meanwhile, there were 27 new companies registered with capital of MOP1 million or over, and the total value of capital amounted to MOP72 million. In the first quarter of 2015, capital of the new companies came mainly from Macao (MOP86 million) and Mainland China (MOP40 million), including MOP35 million from the 9 Provinces of the Pan-Pearl River Delta Region, with that from Guangdong province sharing MOP28 million. Analysed by combination of the shareholders, there were 980 new companies established solely by Macao shareholders, and 145 joint ventures between shareholders from Macao and other countries or regions. At the end of the first quarter of 2015, number of registered companies totalled 49,926, an increase of 5,202 from a year earlier.
…

The opening ceremony of the Macao Annual Visual Arts Exhibition 2015: Chinese Painting and Calligraphy Category hosted by Cultural Affairs Bureau will be held in Nam Van Old Court Building at 6:30pm on 8th May (Friday). The exhibition is an activity of the 26th Macao Arts Festival. It is an annual event for local artists to showcase their talent and creativity. The focus of the Macao Annual Visual Arts Exhibition this year is on Chinese painting and calligraphy, genres which includes Chinese painting, calligraphy, seal-engraving and experimental ink and wash painting, among others. The exhibition will be launched at Nam Van Old Court Building from 9th May to 2nd August 2015. Five experienced artists from various places and fields were previously assigned as members of the adjudication panel. Following painstaking discussion, they selected 74 entries and 10 “Best Works” for the exhibition this year: Wang Sen’s One flower, One world, Ho Loi Seng’s The Swallow Poem to Liu Sou, U Wai Lam’s Jiangnan in February, Lei Tak Seng’s An Impression of Angang Steel Company, Mak Kuong Weng’s Portrait No. 1, Chang Kuok Meng’s Mellow Moonlight, Lio Man Cheong’s Highlights of the Historic Centre of Macao, Chong Kam Seng’s Preface to the Poems Collected from the Orchid Pavilion (Lantingji Xu) by Wang Xizhi, the ‘Sage of Calligraphy’, Tam Chon Kit’s Excursion to Guia Hill and Sou Pui Kun’s Kid Snapping a Twig. The hosting entity initiated the call for submissions from October last year, with 306 works responding to the call in all. The Macao Annual Visual Arts Exhibition has been ardently received and supported over the years. It has gathered local artists who love creativity to present art works with local features and the unique cultural aura of Macao. It is anticipated that through appreciation, display and exchange the development of local art can be galvanised. All are welcome to enjoy the local artists’ creations on this occasion. Nam Van Old Court Building opens from 10:00am to 8:00pm and closes every Monday. Admission is free.
…

The first batch of Culinary Arts Management students is ready for graduation. On 16 and 23 April, they hosted lunch events as their graduation project at the IFT Educational Restaurant, a Michelin-recommended restaurant for 6 consecutive years, and are now preparing to join the city’s bustling restaurant scene. The class was divided in two groups, each asked to prepare a lunch event from scratch. The events each attracted a crowd of around 60 paying customers. The programme coordinator, Invited Assistant Professor Dr. Mark Gibson said, “We spent 4 years training these students in every aspect of the kitchen. They spent 4 years learning how to do this. This was their final project, where they worked in a real life kitchen environment,” he added, “They designed the menu; they practised the menu; they costed the menu.” Student Otilia Rodrigues Novo was chosen as General Manager to head the preparation team for the 16 April lunch event. She expressed, “The most challenging thing was planning the menu. We needed to price the menu to get a good gross profit margin, but we also needed to get quality ingredients for the courses.” After careful analysis, her team chose the following menu: scallop carpaccio as appetiser; honey beer pork belly brisket as main course; and berry mousse with basil sorbet for dessert. The Institute for Tourism Studies’ Bachelor Degree Programme emphasises on the balance between theory and practice. Students are required to complete certain hours of practical tasks related to their specialisations every year. One of the tasks given to the Culinary Arts Management year 4 students is to host lunch event to local residents as their graduation project. Dr. Gibson said the first batch of students in Culinary Arts Management is ready for a successful entry into the job market. “A lot of the students have applied for many of the jobs in the local hotel and restaurant market,” he states. “They are very well-placed to go straight in at a very good level, to Commis Chef 1. That saves them maybe two or three years of on-the-job training.” The Culinary Arts Management bachelor degree programme was launched in academic year 2011/2012 and has 24 places available each year. The curriculum does not only cover chef training, but a wide range of resources during their 4 years of studies, from access to top-notch equipment, to field trips and cooking demonstrations by prestigious chefs. “After a few years, if graduates decide to do some restaurant managing or open their own establishment, they have the skills and the training to do it.” Dr. Gibson stressed. The programme has proven to be highly popular. All intake classes have been largely oversubscribed. “We need to make sure that the programme is relevant to the market, and we have got to keep abreast of the industry,” Dr. Gibson said. IFT is the only public higher education institution in Macao that specialises in cultivating talents for tourism and service industry. It endeavours to equip students with professional knowledge and technical competence in preparation for their future leadership responsibilities in the industry.
…

To further promote the cultural and creative entities listed in the Macao Cultural and Creative Map, the Cultural Affairs Bureau (IC) is now operating a Macao Cultural and Creative Map themed store for demonstration and sale of local original products at the C-Shop in Nam Van, located at Avenida Doutor Mário Soares. This store also offers ticketing services for programmes and activities aiming at introducing Macao’s cultural and creative characteristics to residents and visitors. The “Macao Cultural and Creative Map” themed store at C-Shop will include cultural and creative entities listed in the Map, demonstrating and selling local original products, as well as providing information about cultural and creative activities. It gathers more than one hundred kinds of Macao original products, such as souvenirs, clothing and accessories, household items, books, visual arts and products related to local arts and cultural events. More diversified services are also available at the C-Shop, where residents and visitors can learn about the arts and cultural information and purchase tickets for performances, in addition to enjoying local design and creativity and cultural and creative products with Macao features. Residents and visitors can also obtain the Macao Cultural and Creative Map at the C-Shop for free, and store staff can provide information about the Map to the customers. In order to deepen the residents and visitors’ understanding of Macao cultural and creative spaces, IC has launched the “Macao Cultural and Creative Map” and its smartphone app last year, featuring information on World Heritage sites, museums and bus routes. Through the Map, residents and visitors can explore cultural and creative spaces and creativity in a more extensive way and savour the historical connotations of Macao. The Macao Cultural and Creative Map is now available at nearly 150 locations in Hong Kong and Macao, including checkpoints, museums, hotels, travel agencies and cultural and creative entities. Interested parties can download the app of the Map at www.macaucci.com/app/. The C-Shop at Nam Van is located at Avenida Doutor Mário Soares, Macao (opposite the Old Court Building). The store opening hours are 11:00am-8:00pm daily including public holidays. For enquiries, please call the C-Shop through tel. no. (853) 2850 8121 during office hours. To learn more about the store’s latest news, please visit the store page on Facebook at www.facebook.com/MacaoCreativePavilion.
…

Information from the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC) indicated that the total number of licensed motor vehicles reached 241,955 at the end of March 2015, up by 5.2% year-on-year; motorcycles and light private cars accounted for 51.9% and 41.4% respectively. In the first quarter of 2015, new registration of motor vehicles increased by 11.3% year-on-year to 5,523, of which new registration of motorcycles accounted for 53.0%. Number of traffic accidents totalled 3,771 cases, up by 1.0% year-on-year, resulting in 1,377 casualties and 5 of them were killed. Cross-border vehicle traffic reached 1,261,713 trips in the first quarter of 2015, up by 6.0% year-on-year; vehicle traffic through the Border Gate (970,632 trips) shared 76.9%. Passenger ferry movements between Macao and Hong Kong and between Macao and Mainland China totalled 35,900, an increase of 2.4% year-on-year, with the Ferry Terminal at the Outer Harbour sharing 66.5% of the total (23,875). The Macao International Airport had 12,696 commercial flight movements in the first quarter of 2015, an increase of 9.8% year-on-year. Movements to and from Mainland China and Taiwan increased by 4.0% and 3.9% respectively, while those to and from Vietnam (806) rose by more than 3-fold. Helicopter flight movements between Macao and Hong Kong and between Macao and Mainland China (3,749) increased slightly by 0.3% year-on-year. In the first quarter of 2015, seaborne container throughput totalled 35,531 TEU, equivalent to 23,937 containers handled, up by 15.6% and 9.8% respectively year-on-year. Gross weight of seaborne containerized cargo increased by 10.7% to 63,141 tonnes; meanwhile, gross weight of containerized cargo by land decreased by 13.7%, at 4,270 tonnes. Outward air cargo increased by 5.1% year-on-year to 3,430 tonnes; meanwhile, inward air cargo decreased by 1.8% to 1,698 tonnes. Taiwan remained the major origin and destination of inward and outward air cargo, accounting for 61.7% and 43.6% of the respective total. Transit air cargo increased by 15.3% year-on-year to 1,363 tonnes. At the end of March 2015, number of fixed-line telephone subscribers decreased by 3.3% year-on-year to 151,951. Meanwhile, number of mobile telephone subscribers increased by 11.1% to 1,847,745, of which stored-value GSM card subscribers shared 64.6%. As regards internet services, number of subscribers totalled 311,283 and the cumulative duration of usage reached 253 million hours in the first quarter of 2015, up by 13.1% and 11.8% respectively year-on-year.
…