The big ongoing protests in Hong Kong may not yet have won their political objectives, but they have had a tremendous effect on the island city’s tourism business.
Hong Kong financial secretary Paul Chan Man-po reported in a blog that tourist arrivals in August were down 40% from last August; July’s were down 5% from the previous year. Hotel occupancy rates have fallen by half, he said. The Hong Kong Tourist Board listed 5.2 million tourists in July, a huge number, but significantly lower than in 2018.
Visits from mainland China have dropped even more than those from elsewhere, and travel industry sources say that September and October bookings are also down sharply. The Tourist Board itself has not been sending out its promo tweets since mid-July. Hong Kong-based Cathay Airlines has also had a 38% drop.
