An influx of immigrants from mainland China and talent alongside a slight increase in births have offset an emigration wave in Hong Kong, the latest official data shows.
The Census and Statistics Department announced on Thursday the midyear population stood at 7,531,800, down by 4,300 from 12 months ago, accounting for a decrease of 0.1 per cent.
The government attributed the drop to the unusual situation of “quite a number of” Hong Kong residents who were living abroad returning to the city after pandemic travel restrictions were lifted early last year, temporarily inflating the number used for comparison.
“This situation then restored to normalcy gradually in the later part of 2023, resulting in a slight decline in the population as at end-2023 and mid-2024 as compared to mid-2023,” it said.
But the population still grew compared with the figure at the end of 2023 and the latest number was the second-highest yet.
Authorities noted the success of various measures to attract talent and labour, which drew “sizeable inflow of persons from the mainland and other places around the world to Hong Kong in the first half of 2024”.
In the 12 months to June, the city recorded a net outflow of 30,200 residents, following a strong net inflow of 143,000 people from mid-2022 to mid-2023, triggered by the new talent scheme and the resumption of normal travel.
Net outflows began to pick up from mid-2019 to mid-2020, when the anti-government protests erupted.
The city’s latest net outflow figure was the third-highest in a decade after peaking at 89,200 from mid-2020 to mid-2021 when Britain launched a bespoke immigration pathway in response to Beijing’s imposition of the national security law. The net outflow of residents then dropped to 60,000 in 2022.
According to the latest figures, 44,000 mainlanders arrived in the city through one-way permits, the highest in five years, which effectively offset the outflow of Hongkongers.
The scheme allows 150 mainlanders to settle in Hong Kong each day.
The number of births over the past 12 months also increased to 34,400 from last year’s 32,600, marking a 5 per cent increase.
The number of deaths stood at 52,400, down from the 54,600 recorded in mid-2023.
In 2022, Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu’s administration launched a series of measures aimed at attracting talent to counter the emigration wave.
The policies included the Top Talent Pass Scheme launched in December 2022, which is open to candidates who earned more than HK$2.5 million (US$320,000) over the past 12 months and graduates of the world’s top 100 universities.
According to the Immigration Department, the scheme had received more than 93,000 applications as of July 31, with over 73,000 approved. The department’s data also showed 60,300 of the successful applicants had already arrived in the city.
Combined with other policies, the city had welcomed more than 130,000 people by June, surpassing the government’s target of bringing in 105,000 people over three years.
Paul Yip Siu-fai, chair professor of population health at the University of Hong Kong, said the latest data showed the emigration wave had not slowed down.
“The recent figure shows the number of Hongkongers leaving the city is not low,” he said.
The British government earlier said about 144,400 Hongkongers had arrived in the country by March 2024 since the launch of the scheme in January 2021.
Canada and Australia also offer bespoke citizenship pathways for Hongkongers.
Yip said the increase in births was not significant. The birth figure, according to his knowledge, also included the number of babies aged below one who arrived in the city after being born elsewhere.
The latest birth number does not show the impact of a policy announced by the city leader last October to give HK$20,000 for each new child born in Hong Kong to a parent who is a permanent resident.
