CityU's public funding over the years — UGC subventions, student number completion rates and RGC success at a glance

Government money for universities is not a single lump sum. It is split into three components — teaching, research and professional activity — each calculated through student numbers, discipline cost factors and research assessment results, then handed over in one block for the university to allocate as it sees fit. Bottom line: City University of Hong Kong (CityUHK), one of the eight institutions funded by the University Grants Committee (UGC), received a total UGC grant of approximately HK$3.12 billion^※ in 2023/24 (about 47.5% of its total income that year); the value of its active competitive research projects funded by the Research Grants Council (RGC) stood at approximately HK$3.15 billion^※ over the same period (cumulative, outstanding-project basis, 2023/24 financial year), and in several recent competitive schemes the University has ranked first among the eight institutions. For an overview of annual income and expenditure, see the parent card finances.md.

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# What is the UGC, and how does CityU relate to it?

The University Grants Committee (UGC) is a non-statutory advisory body that distributes public funds to Hong Kong's eight statutory universities on behalf of the HKSAR Government. The eight UGC-funded institutions^※ are: City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong Baptist University, Lingnan University, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, The Education University of Hong Kong, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, and The University of Hong Kong.

CityU has operated under the legal name "City University of Hong Kong" as a statutory body since 1994, and both its legal status and financial oversight fall within the UGC framework. The UGC disburses recurrent funding to CityU and the other seven universities in the form of a block grant, on the principle of "the money follows the institution, and the institution decides how to allocate it" — once a university receives the block grant, how it distributes resources across disciplines is entirely its own decision, with no government interference. A block grant normally covers a three-year period^※, aligned with each institution's three-year academic planning cycle.

The core logic of the system: the government first sets student number targets (student number planning, SNP), then calculates the total block grant along three lines — student numbers, disciplinary resource intensity, and research performance — and finally disburses the amount in one go, leaving the university accountable for "overall quality of teaching and research".

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# How is the block grant calculated? The three components unpacked

The UGC block grant is made up of three components, in roughly the proportions: teaching 78%, research 20%, professional activity 2%^※ (for the 2025–28 triennium).

The teaching grant is by far the largest of the three. In each triennial planning exercise the government fixes the approved student numbers for each institution at each level (sub-degree / undergraduate / taught postgraduate / research postgraduate), then weights them by the "resource intensity" of the discipline — a medicine or engineering place, for example, attracts a higher per-head grant than one in arts or business because of laboratory costs. CityU's total UGC-funded student population (full-time equivalent, FTE) in 2024/25 was 11,447^※, equivalent to 104.4%^※ of its approved SNP target (at full capacity, even slightly over).

The research grant funds the university's research infrastructure. It is not allocated project by project; instead it is driven by two factors: ① the institution's scores in the UGC's periodic Research Assessment Exercise (RAE); and ② its record of success in competitive schemes designated by the RGC. The implication: winning RGC projects pays off twice over — directly in project funding, and indirectly by lifting the research component of the block grant.

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# What is the triennial total, and what share does CityU get?

The HKSAR Government sets the overall funding ceiling for the UGC on a triennium basis.

• 2022–25 triennium: the government allocated approximately HK$63.2 billion^※ as the total recurrent grant for the eight universities.
• 2025–28 triennium: the approved amount is HK$68.1 billion (approximately $68,104 million)^※ over the three years — about $2.8 billion (4%)^※ less than the $70.9 billion the institutions had applied for.

The UGC does not publish institution-by-institution allocations, but CityU's share can be estimated from its financial statements and the UGC's performance measurement documents:

A note on scope: "Subventions from UGC" in the UGC performance measurement document is a broad, main-campus figure that includes the block grant and various government ear-marked funds; the "Block Grant" line in the financial statements is its core component. CityU's 2024/25 treasurer's report states the block grant explicitly as HK$2,517 million^※, with a further research grant of HK$334 million^※ and subventions from government bodies of HK$429 million^※, adding up to total government subventions of HK$3,790 million^※.

Worth noting: CityU's UGC subvention as a share of total income has been consistently falling — from 70.4% in 2021/22 to 47.5% in 2023/24. This is not because the grant has shrunk (in fact it edged up from HK$3.01 billion to HK$3.12 billion), but because tuition income (especially from self-financed taught postgraduate programmes) and investment returns have expanded rapidly, diluting the ratio. From a long-term financial health perspective, this means CityU's dependence on public money is structurally declining while its self-financing capacity grows.

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# How does SNP define CityU's "floor"?

Student number planning (SNP) is the physical foundation of the teaching component of the block grant — the more approved places you have, the more teaching grant you draw. CityU's funded student population in recent years:

For 2024/25, broken down by mode of study (UGC-funded basis, FTE estimates): undergraduate students approximately 12,361^※ (local + non-local; this row is total enrolment, not purely UGC-funded places), research postgraduate students approximately 1,060^※; the funded quota for taught postgraduate places is relatively small (53 FTE in 2024/25^※). From 2024/25 the government raised the cap on non-local students from 20% to 40% of locally-funded places, giving CityU ample policy room to expand non-local enrolment.

Exceeding the SNP target (104.4% in 2024/25) is not a violation — the UGC allows some flexibility — but persistent over-enrolment may trigger an annual adjustment mechanism.

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# RGC competitive funding: how does CityU stand out among its peers?

The Research Grants Council (RGC) is an independent expert committee operating under the UGC that distributes competitive research funding through peer review. It sits entirely outside the block grant system — both draw on public money, but the mechanisms could not be more different: the block grant is recurrent funding, while RGC grants are competitive project awards that must be applied for and assessed case by case, allocated on research merit.

CityU's recent success in major RGC schemes:

Data scope: CRF figures are the sum of grant amounts for projects where CityU is the Lead Institution; CityU's share of cross-institutional projects as a Participating Institution is not included. The RGC does not publish per-institution totals in its press releases; the above figures are compiled project by project from the official results lists.

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# How large is CityU's total research portfolio?

The UGC's performance measurement document (PM 2.1) discloses CityU's all-source research funding (including RGC, government ear-marked funds, private funding, overseas sources and all other competitive grants):

"Active project value" is a stock concept — the sum of remaining grant amounts across all ongoing competitive projects; "cash received" is a cash-flow figure. New awards in 2023/24 reached HK$850 million^※, with notable compound growth across the three years — a sign of CityU's steadily rising research competitiveness.

Over the same period, the value of active competitive projects per full-time academic staff member rose from HK$1.99 million in 2021/22 to HK$2.64 million in 2023/24^※, an increase of 32.7%^※; the per-staff figure for new awards in the year rose from HK$0.440 million to HK$0.590 million^※, up 34.1%^※.

The Matching Grant Scheme, which pairs government money with private and corporate research donations, is another lever behind these numbers — see Section 3 of endowment-campaigns-and-matching-grants.md.

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# Does the falling share of block grant income mean CityU is "de-public-funding" itself?

Short answer: not "de-public-funding" but "diversification". In absolute terms, CityU's UGC subvention rose from HK$3.01 billion in 2021/22 to HK$3.12 billion in 2023/24 (up about 3.6% over two years). But total income over the same span surged from HK$4.28 billion to HK$6.57 billion^※ (up 53%), driven mainly by self-financed taught postgraduate tuition and investment returns. The ratio fell from 70.4% to 47.5% simply because the denominator grew.

There are two sides to this trend. On one hand, CityU's financial structure is becoming more diversified and more resilient to economic cycles. On the other, the government's combination of "block grant plus slower growth plus demands to return surplus reserves" is effectively tightening the pace of public funding growth — in 2024/25 CityU was required to return HK$382 million^※ from its general and development reserve funds to the government, part of the UGC-wide arrangement requiring institutions to hand back excess reserves. With the 2025–28 triennium set at HK$68.1 billion — ~$2.8 billion (about 4%)^※ below what the institutions requested — plus annual efficiency savings of about 2%, public subsidy is effectively on a path of gentle austerity.

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# Key figures at a glance

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