HONG KONG - Hong Kong, this Asian financial capital, which returned to the Chinese mainland in 1997, is getting serious about the central government's ambitious five-year plan. The Hong Kong government is holding a summit about it on Monday with business leaders, economists and academics. Newspapers are running front-page stories and editorials about the grand plan.

"I think the whole world should be reading these five-year plans," said corporate leader Victor Fung, who acknowledged he had not taken the plans seriously until recently.

Fung said that even in today's fast-changing world, the Chinese government sticks to the plans religiously, giving companies a clear indication of where it sees the booming economy heading.

"The mainlanders don't change. You can see what they're going to do. They tell you up front," said Fung, group chairman of the Li & Fung Group, one of Hong Kong's oldest trading companies. The firm buys garments, tableware and other products from factories in the mainland.

China is already on its 11th five-year plan, which was adopted late last year and runs through 2010. It calls for a speed-up in financial reforms, faster development of energy resources, measures to spur domestic consumer demand and rural reforms to narrow the yawning gap in income between the cities and countryside.

Robert Kapp, an American business consultant, said the latest plan is interesting because it's not an old-fashioned Stalinist plan heavy on commands. As China moves toward a more market-oriented economy, the central government must use a lighter touch and try to guide the provinces rather than ordering them what to do, he said.

"It lays out broad thematic goals for the economy and trajectories the government hopes the society will travel," said Kapp, who headed the U.S.-China Business Council from 1994 through 2004.

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