The Hong Kong Tourism Board (HKTB) released its "Top Recommendations List" on Monday, recommending that tourists should eat dim sum, visit Tai O Fishing Village on Outlying Islands and the Avenue of Stars in Tsim Sha Tsui. Since the resumption of customs clearance between Hong Kong and the mainland, the flow of inbound and outbound tourists has been on the rise. HKTB predicts that the number of people visiting Hong Kong during the May Day Golden Week will reach 50% of the pre-epidemic level.
In order to promote visitors to enjoy the most authentic Hong Kong, HKTB held the "Hello Hong Kong · I Want to Recommend - My Favorite Experience of Hong Kong" poll earlier. 30,000 Hong Kong citizens were invited to vote for 15 travel experiences in terms of "taste", "natural beauty" and "Downtown corner" to create the "Best Recommendation List of Hong Kong Travel". Among them, the most recommended unique food, the top five, in order: dim sum, silk stockings milk tea, egg tart, egg, Wonton noodles. Tai O fishing Village on the outlying Islands, Ha Pak Nai in Yuen Long, Thousand Island Lake in Tuen Mun, Man Yi Geological Walk in Sai Kung, and Tai Mo Shan in Tsuen Wan-Tai Po rounded out the top five. The top five downtown attractions were the Avenue of Stars in Tsim Sha Tsui, Wong Tai Sin Temple, Women's Street/Goldfish Street in Mong Kok, Stone Street in Central and Jordan Temple Street.
In addition to choosing their favourite travel experiences, people also shared their favourite experiences, including must-see attractions - Peak and theme park, art and cultural attractions - M+, Hong Kong Palace Museum and Hong Kong Museum of Art, scenic relaxing tour - bicycle tour, authentic life experience - market tour, and leisurely Victoria Harbour tour - Star Ferry, tram and double-decker bus tour. In the future, HKTB will continue to promote the list to visitors around the world through different means such as website, social media platform and celebrity sharing, so as to attract more visitors to taste Hong Kong.
The number of visitors reached 4.41 million in the first quarter
According to the latest figures, in the first quarter of this year, the number of visitors to Hong Kong reached 4.41 million. In March alone, the number of visitors to Hong Kong reached 2.454 million, an increase of 68% on a monthly basis. The tourists mainly came from the mainland and Southeast Asia. The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government, airlines and tourism enterprises have launched a "combination of measures", actively promoting through multiple channels and combining various innovative products to further stimulate tourists' willingness to visit during the "May Day" Golden Week and accelerate the recovery of Hong Kong tourism market. Cheng Dingyi, director general of the Hong Kong Tourism Board, said the recovery speed of Hong Kong's tourism industry is ideal. The number of mainland tourists entering Hong Kong has recovered to 45 percent of the pre-epidemic level. The next peak number of tourists visiting Hong Kong is expected to be the May Day Golden Week, when the number of visitors will reach 50 percent of the pre-epidemic level.
Demand for mainland travel to Hong Kong continues to grow, and Ctrip ranked Hong Kong as the top destination city for outbound air ticket bookings for this year's May Day holiday. From April 1, 66 Chinese railway stations on the mainland will connect with Hong Kong's West Kowloon Station, basically resuming operations at the same level as in 2019. The convenience of travel to Hong Kong from the mainland has soared with the sale of cross-border trains from Guangdong Province. Ctrip's May Day travel orders to Hong Kong from mainland China increased by 213% compared with early April (April 1-5), and group tour orders to Hong Kong also increased by 7.2 times.
Hong Kong's tourism industry faces two major challenges
Hong Kong tour operators worry that supply is failing to keep up with demand and "cheap" tour groups are the two most prominent problems in the city's tourism industry. In addition to looking forward to the intervention of the Hong Kong government, through various preferential policies to attract restaurants and hotels to reopen, to ensure the balance between supply and demand during the May Day holiday, because the market is slow to adjust. At the same time, we also hope to timely make reasonable regulation on tour fees and arrangements, so as to ensure that travel agencies and related partners have basic income, so as to provide appropriate services to tourists. To avoid the "lose-lose" mode of reducing the interests of travel agencies, hotels, restaurants and other businesses, the tourism industry is trying to arrange mainland tour groups to have meals at the cruise ship restaurants, which will not only ease the traffic burden, but also stay away from residential areas.
Hong Kong tour operators are trying to come up with brand new products that will attract attention. The Duffy and Friends Tour is available at Hong Kong Disneyland Resort from today to June 22. Visitors can enter the new "Duffy and Friends Playhouse" (play around Duffy bear and friends living room and cook dog CookieAnn kitchen), experience the pink fox LinaBell themed room, select limited themed products, enjoy the latest themed food, and at the same time, through augmented reality technology (AR) and other interactive experience, Enjoy music on the coast with Turtle Olu Mel, visit painter Gelatoni's art gallery, and count butterflies in LinaBell's forest maze.
