Early signs of life in Hong Kong tourism as mainland Chinese visitors return, but no boom yet for hotels, restaurants

The number of city residents taking off on holiday outstripped arrivals since border reopened fully

Industry stays optimistic, with hotels pinning their hopes on mainland’s ‘golden week’ holiday in May

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Mainland tourists at Golden Bauhinia Square. Photo: Xiaomei Chen

Published: 8:30am, 13 Feb 2023Updated: 10:08am, 13 Feb 2023

Hong Kong’s tourism sector has shown early signs of revival since the border with mainland China fully reopened a week ago, with more bookings for hotel rooms and attractions and increased footfall in shops.

But the city’s catering sector reported only modest improvement, mainly in areas popular with tourists, as the return of mainland visitors was outstripped by Hongkongers taking off on holiday.

Hong Kong has seen a steady increase in mainland visitors arriving through all checkpoints since February 6, when pre-departure polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests and a daily quota on arrivals were scrapped.

Tourists from the mainland are coming to the city, but the outflow of residents on holidays exceeds arrivals from the north. Photo: Elson Li

The number of overseas and mainland visitors almost doubled from 33,187 last Monday to 65,804 on Saturday, when 196,792 residents left the city.

Since February 2, the Tourism Board has given away at least a million spending vouchers worth HK$100 (US$13) each under the “Hong Kong Goodies” campaign to welcome back visitors.

Hotels saw an uptick in business over Lunar New Year, but overall occupancy has since softened, with no clear sign of sustained recovery, according to Winnie Chan Wun-yin, association manager at the Federation of Hong Kong Hotel Owners.

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