Free ice cream, tram and Star Ferry trips for Hong Kong’s ‘Art March’ as city works to boost tourism
- Freebies announced as travel industry experts say heightened social media presence and better links with other Greater Bay Area cities will speed recovery
- Culture and tourism chief Kevin Yeung says government for first time will promote events it backs under ‘Art March’ banner
But travel industry experts urged the government on Thursday to step up its social media presence and improve coordination with other cities in the Greater Bay Area, arguing that traditional ways of reaching visitors had changed dramatically.
Authorities were throwing organisational and funding support behind the newly branded “Art March”, culture and tourism minister Kevin Yeung Yun-hung noted, saying the government was pleased to back the roster of events with special offers.
“You will also find exciting events including free ice cream distribution, tram rides and Star Ferry rides at different times to promote ‘Art March’ and its programmes,” he said, adding full details of the special offers would be announced soon.
About 1,000 participants have been invited to the International Cultural Summit organised by the West Kowloon Cultural District Authority on March 25 and 26, and the following week, at least 40 countries and territories will be represented at Art Basel. Galleries are also expected to hold events to fill out the schedule for the month.
The government hoped the promotional push would raise awareness that Hong Kong remained an artistically vital city, Yeung said, as he urged businesses to take part in the effort.
“Tourism-related industries, such as hotels, retail and catering, are encouraged to join hands with the arts and cultural sectors in polishing the brand of ‘Art March’ to provide citizens and visitors with an enriched artistic journey,” he said.
Elsewhere in the city, tourism industry leaders gathered at a forum to discuss ways Hong Kong could make better use of social media to advertise itself and work with bay area cities to promote multi-destination travel.
The bay area scheme is Beijing’s plan to link Hong Kong, Macau and nine mainland Chinese cities to create an economic and business powerhouse.
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Kenny Sham Ho-ki, the general manager of Hong Kong travel booking platform Klook, told the “Shaping the Future of the Travel Industry” forum that the pandemic had sped up the transformation of social media platforms as deeply influential promotional tools.
“The global trend of consumer opportunities and decision-making is no longer reliant only on traditional media or search engines, but also through social media,” he explained. “Social media can pique consumers’ interests to travel to a place, to visit an attraction or to attend certain seasonal festivals.”
Sham added consumers paid close attention to what they saw on platforms such as Instagram, TikTok and the mainland’s Xiaohongshu, even going so far as to describe the effect on some as “brainwashing”, but saying the shift could present major opportunities for businesses.
Gianna Hsu Wong Mei-lun, the chairwoman of the Travel Industry Council, highlighted that Hong Kong played a vital role in culture and tourism development in the bay area and occupied a strategic position for mainland and international tourists.
“As Hong Kong and the mainland’s transport links grow more comprehensive, we should be considering how to join hands – and not compete – with [bay area] cities to complement each other … in promoting multiple-destination travel,” she said.
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Hsu added the city’s tourism recovery had been slowed by the fierce competition from across the region, as well as airline capacity and staffing problems.
“While it will take a while for us to return fully to pre-pandemic levels, I am still optimistic and confident about the future of the industry,” she said.
Hsu added visitor numbers over the eight-day Lunar New Year holiday were 103 per cent of the figure recorded over the same period in 2018 and that Hong Kong hotels recorded an 80 per cent occupancy rate.
She noted 2,000 mainland tourist groups, with 66,000 people, visited Hong Kong during the holiday this month.
Tourism Board figures showed the city welcomed almost 34 million visitors last year, nearly 27 million of them from the mainland.
The figures were a massive increase on the 604,564 people logged in 2022, 375,130 of them from the mainland, when the city’s strict pandemic rules were still in force.
Separately, Hong Kong’s flag carrier Cathay Pacific Airways said it continued to recover from the pandemic. Its premium Cathay Pacific brand and budget arm HK Express carried more than 2 million passengers in January combined, the company said.
Last month, Cathay Pacific carried 1.71 million passengers, a 66.4 per cent increase over the same period last year, and hauled 114,790 tonnes of cargo, 20.7 per cent more than a year ago, it said.
