The Hindu Business Line : Tourist traffic to Hong Kong up

THE SARS shadow seems to be slowly lifting. According to the Hong Kong Tourism Board (HKTB), Indian tourists and others are back to travelling to Hong Kong.

HKTB on Tuesday announced that arrivals from India in March totalled 19,780, reflecting a growth of 32.1 per cent on the same month in 2003. Total visitor arrivals to Hong Kong in March were 1,732,326, a growth of 28.6 per cent on the March 2003.

For the first quarter of 2004, overall arrivals from all markets reached 4,935,200, a growth of 14.7 per cent compared with the same period in 2003 and 37.3 per cent compared with that of 2002.

Visitor arrivals from India stood at 51,096, a growth of 18.8 per cent over the same period last year. In a statement, the HKTB Executive Director, Ms Clara Chong, noted that the board would be benchmarking its arrivals data against 2002 figures over the next few months to provide a more accurate indication of performance.

"Last year arrivals in April, May and June fell to their lowest levels in 12 years as a result of SARS, so we are going to record some quite dramatic growth rates using the normal year-on-year comparison," she explained.

"However, there are still many uncertainties that could slow down the recovery momentum, especially now that SARS has resurfaced in northern China. Japan remains our most difficult challenge and it is likely to take some time before we can regain the full confidence of that market," she noted.

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