Agencies and influencers are marketing Hong Kong’s government-run Vocational Training Council (VTC) courses to pregnant women in mainland China as a low-cost way to secure Hong Kong residency — in practice, right of abode — for their newborns, the South China Morning Post reported Sunday, based on its own investigation.
The packages being sold cost less than HK$100,000 (about $12,600) including the agencies’ commission, which the Post describes as the cheapest route these agencies currently offer for mainland mothers seeking Hong Kong status for a child born in the city. The agencies pitch the arrangement on the claim that it would make it easier for the child to later gain admission to top-tier mainland Chinese universities, and could even open the door to a mainland civil-service job — benefits tied to the child’s eventual Hong Kong identity rather than to the VTC course itself.
The report does not detail how the VTC enrollment is formally linked to a route into Hong Kong residency, nor does it cite any comment yet from the Vocational Training Council, Hong Kong’s Immigration Department, or Chinese authorities on the practice. The benefits described above — easier university admission, a possible civil-service job — are the agencies’ own marketing claims as reported by the Post, not confirmed outcomes.
