Surge in visitors gives Tourism Board hope of reaching targets

After several below-par months, a surge in visitors to Hong Kong over the past two weeks - thanks largely to the mainland's National Day 'golden week' holiday - has given the Tourism Board fresh hope its arrivals target for this year can be met.

Between the start of the month and last Thursday, the number of visitors from the mainland was up 30 per cent on the same period last year and the overall number of visitors up 12 per cent.

With this surge the year-on-year drop, to date, in visitors narrowed to 2 per cent, close to the board's target for the year of a 1.6 per cent drop on 2008 arrivals, to just over 29 million. Of the forecast total arrivals, the board expects about 60 per cent to come from the mainland.

'Hopefully, in the coming few months we can catch up and achieve our original full-year target,' board chairman James Tien Pei-chun said.

The global financial crisis and the swine flu pandemic have affected visitor arrivals. There were year-on-year drops in visitor numbers of 13.4 per cent in May, 15 per cent in June and 12.2 per cent in July.

The board is looking for visitor numbers to pick up between October and December, which is traditionally the peak season for arrivals. The board is promoting 10 days of events, starting next week, under the banner of the Hong Kong Food and Wine Year.