Currently, the office is led by a senior official with the equivalent rank of a policy secretary but it has little practical importance.

In future, it will be a more hands-on office to deal with cross-border issues such as food safety and assistance to Hong Kong citizens in the mainland.

The head of the office will be technically downgraded from a rank of Directorate Grade 8 to Grade 6, a move officials say will actually be more effective. The current head, Bowen Leung, a former private secretary to colonial Governor Chris Patten, is due to retire next month.

A successor has been chosen from the civil service but the government has yet to announce the name.

Tsang is committed to using the Beijing office as a conduit for closer ties and cooperation with provincial authorities, a senior source said.

`` It is not a move to downgrade the Beijing office but to cope with genuine need,'' the source said.

The revamp was prompted by the need to overhaul the existing notification system with mainland authorities since the outbreak of pig-borne disease in Sichuan, the source said.

The government concluded that the Beijing office should switch its portfolio to practical networking with mainland counterparts over cross-border issues. The office should act as a frontline alert system on issues like epidemics, tainted food and petroleum shortages, the source said.

Shiu Sin-por, executive director of the One Country, Two Systems Research Center, welcomed the revamp.

``There are increasing demands for assistance over medical support, information flow, trade ties, traffic arrangement and a notification system as the growing integration of people over the border poses a genuine need for better communication and pragmatic cooperation,'' Shiu said.

A mainland official, who refused to be named, was critical of the office.

``It is a pity that Leung and his office were handicapped over direct communication with the Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office despite their phyiscal presence in Beijing,'' the official said. ``Both former chief executive Tung [Chee-hwa] and Tsang refused to delegate direct communication with Beijing to Leung's office and made its networking role futile.''

The goal now, said a government source, ``is to find someone to work for better liaison in Beijing.''