Hong Kong’s new world promotional marketing campaign will “kickstart” town’s reopening to worldwide vacationers, the Hong Kong Tourism Board instructed CNBC’s “Squawk Field Asia” on Friday.
As a part of the “Howdy Hong Kong” marketing campaign, which was launched on Thursday, 500,000 air tickets will likely be given away over the following six months, beginning in March.
The tickets will likely be given out by three Hong Kong’s carriers — Cathay Pacific, HK Specific and Hong Kong Airways.
The free tickets are a part of the HK$2 billion ($255 milion) aid package deal that the federal government supplied to airways in 2020, in the course of the peak of the pandemic.
The Hong Kong Tourism Board can be investing a minimal of HK$100 million within the promotion of the marketing campaign’s preliminary part, it mentioned on the launch ceremony.
However Hong Kong nonetheless faces a “dilemma” — its infrastructure has some catching as much as do to accommodate the rise in guests, mentioned Dane Cheng, the tourism board’s govt director.
“I believe this dilemma, we now have truly been seeing from different markets and locations once they began to reopen within the final yr or so. It is tough to catch up … notably for the airways, the airports and even inns,” he instructed CNBC.
“[But] you wish to kickstart and … inform the world in a transparent message that Hong Kong after which mainland — we now have lastly reopened.”
How the tickets are allotted
The ticket giveaway will likely be phased: It is going to begin with Southeast Asian markets, adopted by mainland China and North Asia, and lastly, different elements of the world.
Some 80,000 tickets have additionally been reserved for Hong Kong residents which authorities goal to offer out in the summertime.
The variety of tickets for every area was primarily based on “visitors shares” and customer numbers from earlier than the pandemic, mentioned Cheng.
Fred Lam, the CEO of Hong Kong’s airport authority, additionally expects the free tickets to have multiplying results on the variety of guests.
“We hope those that acquired the tickets will convey 2-Three extra family and friends with them [to Hong Kong],” based on CNBC’s translations of Lam’s feedback on the marketing campaign launch ceremony.
“Although we’re solely giving out 500,000 air tickets, we imagine it is going to convey in additional than 1.5 million incoming vacationers,” Lam added. That is about 10% of the whole variety of guests anticipated in the course of the marketing campaign interval.
As for the way guests can get their fingers on these free tickets, it is going to rely upon “native market laws and customs,” he mentioned.
“[That] may embody large-scale fortunate attracts, giving it out by a first-come-first serve foundation, providing buy-on-get-one free tickets, or by sport participations,” Lam mentioned.
‘Very clearly reopened’
On Friday, China mentioned cross-border journey with Hong Kong and Macao would absolutely resume from Feb. 6, scrapping obligatory pre-departure exams and lifting arrival quotas, based on a Reuters report.
“I believe it is very clear that the Hong Kong authorities and in addition our mainland central authorities has been very prudent and so they [made] it very clear that every little thing needs to be resumed in an orderly and progressive method,” mentioned Cheng.
He added that earlier than the pandemic, Hong Kong had “over 25 million in a single day guests” annually, and it’ll take town time to “get again” these numbers.
Return of MICE occasions in Hong Kong
Cheng mentioned the previous two to a few years had been “tough” for Hong Kong’s MICE (conferences, incentives, conferences & exhibitions) business, which introduced in additional than 1.6 million abroad guests in 2019, earlier than the pandemic.
“The final yr or so, different international locations and cities and locations have began opening up and naturally we now have some great occasions which have been in Hong Kong for years,” mentioned Cheng.
“Anchor occasions [were] transferring out and so they apologize, ‘We’ll different locations in Southeast Asia, Center East,’ or some simply mainly postpone or defer.”
Nonetheless, he mentioned town is now “assured” and “trying ahead to receiving guests” once more.
That may be seen by its “Howdy Hong Kong” marketing campaign, which has a 2023 lineup of greater than 250 occasions and festivals — together with the Hong Kong Marathon, the Clockenflap music competition and Hong Kong Rugby Sevens.
There are additionally greater than 100 worldwide MICE occasions deliberate for the yr, mentioned town’s tourism board.
This text was initially printed by cnbc.com. Learn the authentic article right here.
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