How Hong Kong can reap benefits of Beijing’s eased tax refund rules for visitors

Hong Kong should collaborate with mainland China on tourism initiatives in the Greater Bay Area and beyond to capitalise on Beijing’s recent easing of tax refund rules for visitors, industry leaders have said.

Chung Pok-man, vice-chairman of the Hong Kong Department Stores and Commercial Staff General Union, said on Wednesday that the mainland’s recently relaxed policies alone would not be enough to attract more overseas visitors to the city and authorities should focus on multi-destination tourism within the bay area.

“It depends on the travel plans of these foreign tourists,” he said.

“If they are primarily visiting the Yangtze River Delta or areas like Beijing and Xian, it will be difficult to divert them to Hong Kong.”

He said the Hong Kong government needed to link up with mainland authorities to get more visitors to enjoy trips in which they stayed in multiple bay area cities.

“I hope the government, while promoting inbound tourism to the mainland, can also introduce incentives or plans that allow tourists to visit all three places in the Greater Bay Area – Macau, Hong Kong and Guangdong,” he said.