Tourism continues role as growth driver

Visitor arrivals in 2012 rose 16% year-on-year.

It came to 48.6 million persons, said the Tourism Board. Of this total, 49% or 23.8 million persons were overnight arrivals, up 6.5% on last year. Mainland China contributed more than 34.9 million arrivals, up 24.2%.

Increased arrivals were recorded from South Korea (+5.6%) and the Philippines (+7.6%), while arrivals from Taiwan dropped 2.8%. For long-haul markets, the UK achieved year-on-year growth of 5.3%, bringing the country’s yearly arrivals to more than 530,000 persons.

Tourism Board provisional statistics show the total tourism expenditure associated with inbound tourism in 2012 is estimated at HK$306.5 billion, 16.5% more than in 2011. Overnight visitors' per capita spending is projected to grow 4.7% to HK$7,819.