Visitor arrivals to Hong Kong surged to a new single-month record in July 2011. According to the latest data from the Hong Kong Tourism Board (HKTB), 3.84 million people visited the city last month – 22.4% more than the same month last year, and the highest monthly total ever recorded. For the first seven months of 2011, visitor arrivals reached 23.17 million, an increase of 15.9% compared to the same period last year.
The growth in July was driven primarily by the short-haul markets, especially mainland China, South Korea and Southeast Asia. The HKTB said this was largely a result of tactical promotions launched by the travel trade.
Visitor arrivals from mainland China jumped 33.1% year-on-year in July to 2.67 million – another monthly record. Among the short-haul markets, South Korea was the strongest performer with growth of 17.9% to nearly 90,000 arrivals, while arrivals from Southeast Asia rose 8.4% to in excess of 250,000. Within the region, Singapore, Thailand and Malaysia achieved double-digit growth of 16.3%, 15.4% and 12.8% respectively. Despite the impact of cross-strait flights to mainland China, arrivals from Taiwan increased by more than 10% to around 90,000 in July. Arrivals from Japan however, declined 3.4%.
In the long-haul market, arrivals remained at similar level to last July, with Europe, Africa and the Middle East registering slight decline of 0.4%. The emerging Russian market however, continued to surge with year-on-year growth of 52.5%.
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