Hong Kong has seen a surge in the number of mainland tourists in the past five years as the mainland became its biggest tourism market, said a Hong Kong official attending the Jiangsu Hong Kong Week.
Hong Kong Tourism Board statistics show that in 2001, the region received a record 13.7 million tourists, of whom more than one third came from the mainland.
Mainland tourists' average spending of 5,169 HK dollars (US$660) also topped the tourist statistics, Clara Chong, executive director of the board, said in the capital of the eastern Jiangsu province.
Chong said she hoped people in Jiangsu would get to know Hong Kong better during this week-long event.
She said her board would further cooperate with Jiangsu whose citizens accounted for one tenth of all mainland tourists to Hong Kong.
Meanwhile, Hong Kong is the third largest tourist market for Jiangsu which received 293,000 tourist arrivals from Hong Kong.
(eastday.com December 13, 2002)
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