The vice-chancellor of the University of Hong Kong (HKU) on Friday said the institution would shoulder the financial challenges with the SAR amid a potential funding cut to the education sector.

Financial Secretary Paul Chan earlier hinted there was room to reduce education spending with a public deficit of HK$100 billion, pointing to substantial reserves of local universities.

At a media luncheon, Zhang Xiang said he hopes any spending cuts would be moderate.

“As a responsible community member, HKU will shoulder with the community, we will all together face this challenge,” he said.

“We also hope that the government's financial cuts to the higher education will be moderate so we can survive.”

Zhang said that while HKU has reserves which it built up over 100 years, much of this money has already been earmarked for future projects.

“We are building many buildings, more than 10 buildings on campus. This itself is multi-billion dollars already earmarked for this,” he said.

The HKU head added that a large portion of reserves consist of endowment funds from donors that support professorships.