What actually matters in Hong Kong’s push for Muslim visitors?

Since Covid-19 travel and quarantine restrictions were lifted in Hong Kong in early 2023, visitors from traditional medium- and long-haul tourist markets – Australasia, North America and Japan, in particular – have largely given Hong Kong a miss. While an interlocking series of understandable-yet-unfortunate overseas perceptions and local realities are partially responsible, the simple truth remains; despite various “relaunch” campaigns, visitor numbers from these places have not recovered to anything like pre-pandemic levels.

In tandem, long-standing stopover passengers, who typically staged through Hong Kong at one or both ends of the Europe-Australasia journey, now tend to fly via Middle Eastern aviation hubs such as Dubai and…