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CROSS-STRAIT TALKS: HK tourism sector worries over cross-strait direct flights

With a new air link pact between Taiwan and China likely to take effect soon, Hong Kong’s tourism sector was concerned about being marginalized amid the changing situation in the Taiwan Strait, the Hong Kong-based Ming Pao newspaper reported on Wednesday.

Citing an executive of the Hong Kong Association of Travel Agents, the newspaper said the local tourism sector feared that it might lose about 1 million China-bound transit travelers from Taiwan per year — or two-thirds last year’s total number of Taiwanese transit passengers in the former British colony.

The new daily charter flights will make cross-strait travel more convenient, enabling Taiwanese travelers to head for many regions in China without having to detour via Hong Kong, the executive said.

Some Hong Kong tourism operators were worried that a large number of individual Chinese tourists will be attracted to Taiwan instead of Hong Kong, as several important Chinese cities, such as Shenzhen and Tianjin, have been added to the direct cross-strait air service program.

Others contend that Hong Kong should take advantage of the more direct cross-strait flights “to promote a special ‘greater China’ tour package featuring Hong Kong, Taiwan and Shenzhen.”

Hong Kong Tourism Board (HKTB) chairman James Tien said the expanded Taiwan-China airlinks will certainly have a negative impact on the willingness of Taiwanese tourists to visit Hong Kong.

In an effort to mitigate the impact, the HKTB is considering an upgrade of the functions of its Taipei office, he said.

Taiwan and China signed four cooperation accords on Tuesday in Taipei, including one on the expansion of the cross-strait weekend charter flights that were launched in early July.

At present, all non-stop cross-strait charters must pass through the Hong Kong Flight Information Region, which adds to the travel time between cities in central and northern China and Taiwan.

Under the new agreement, the 36 non-stop charter flights that have been plying the Taiwan-China route Friday to Monday since July will be increased to 108 non-stop charters per week, with direct flights available every day of the week. The number of destinations in China will also be expanded to 21, up from the existing five.

Apart from Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Xiamen and Nanjing — which were included in the first phase of the cross-strait weekend charter program — the new pact will open services to cities scattered throughout China such as Shenzhen, Chengdu, Chongqing, Hangzhou, Tianjin and Dalian.

In the future, a flight between Taipei and Shanghai will take as little as 81 minutes, while a Taipei-Beijing flight will take 166 minutes.

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