All Guangdong residents will be eligible to visit Hong Kong as individuals by the middle of next year, Chinese-language media reported Wednesday.

Huang Ziqiang, director-general of the Hong Kong and Macao Affairs Office in Guangdong, told newspapers late Tuesday that the scheme would be extended to all of Guangdong in two batches over the next six months.

"The rest of the province's 13 cities will be opened (to the individual travel scheme) in two batches," Huang said.

The scheme was now waiting for formal approval from the Central Government and would be extended to other parts of the mainland in future, he said.

The scheme was implemented in July when individuals from eight cities in Guangdong became eligible to travel independently to Hong Kong.

The go-ahead has now been given to residents from 13 more cities including the surrounding areas that fall under urban jurisdictions.

Huang said the public security authorities in the 13 cities were already preparing the necessary administrative procedures to allow the residents to travel to Hong Kong, pending the green light from the Central Government.

Ambrose Lee, secretary for security for the Hong Kong government, said Hong Kong would endeavor to match the gradually rising inflow of tourists by beefing up manpower at checkpoints.

To cope with the increasing volume of cross-boundary traffic, both Hong Kong and Guangdong had taken a number of measures to enhance clearance capacity, said an official statement issued by the Hong Kong government.

They include extending the clearance hours to 24 hours, streamlining the clearance procedures, applying high technology, improving cross-boundary facilities and building new cross-border links.

Residents from Shanghai and Beijing were also granted permission to make visits individually to Hong Kong in September.

So far, 1.35 million applications have been received by the Hong Kong government for travelling to the city via the Individual Traveler's Scheme, with 1.23 million having been approved.

(Shenzhen Daily December 26, 2003)