Giving away free tickets for flights may grab the headlines, but will
the gimmick provide a quick fix to restore post-pandemic tourist
arrivals?
Not
necessarily so, says aviation data analyst OAG, which has taken a close
look at Hong Kong’s visitor economy in the months since it removed
barriers to entry in December 2022.
The Hong Kong Tourism Board gave away 700,000 free air tickets via
Cathay Pacific, HK Express, Hong Kong Airlines and Greater Bay Airlines
to travellers in South-east Asia, China, North-east Asia and Europe, in
hopes the big giveaway will generate a faster recovery in tourist
numbers.
Following its reopening, Hong Kong has rapidly added back more than
half a million seats, growing airline capacity to 1.7 million in March
2023, 56% below 2019 levels.
However, as OAG notes, “We’ve seen from Asia’s slow reopening, adding
back capacity to reach the mid-way point of recovery tends to be fast.
“But it is getting across that 80% recovery line that proves to be
tricky, and with Hong Kong so reliant on Northeast Asia for its
capacity, it’s going to be a slow burn to reach back to 2019 levels.”
Cathay Pacific has done its best to help the recovery by adding back
capacity at a fast pace but OAG – and everyone else, for that matter –
concedes Hong Kong's aviation recovery “is inextricably linked to
Greater China's reopening”.
OAG’s forward-looking scheduled data doesn’t point to much of an
uplift in seat capacity from China by June 2023, reaching 356k seats –
“but we need to take that with a pinch of salt, as we know that China
tends to adjust their airline schedules very late, and we expect to see
much more additional capacity”, the data analyst suggests.