The city’s Tourism Board will hand out HK$200 coupons to tourists from eight new mainland cities included in the Individual Visit Scheme as Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu thanked Beijing’s support for extending the coverage of the scheme twice in three months.
The eight cities include Taiyuan of Shanxi province, Hohhot of Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, Harbin of Heilongjiang, Lhasa of Tibet, Lanzhou of Gansu, Xining of Qinghai, Yinchuan of Ningxia, and Urumqi of Xinjiang, bringing the total number to 59.
Speaking on Tuesday before the Executive Council meeting, Lee said the scheme is a major source of tourists for Hong Kong and accounted for about 60 percent of all mainland tourists recorded last year.
The eight newly added cities are all provincial capitals with their growing economies and high spending power. The total population accumulated to over 38 million and the GDP reached 280 yuan Renminbi in 2023, Lee…
