Catering industry concern prospects as locals crowd the mainland during long holidays

Around 800,000 Hong Kong residents were heading north during the past two days of the Chung Yeung Festival holiday, causing the local catering sector to worry about their business.

The Immigration Department's figures showed that the number of outbound Hong Kong people in the past two days was 466,851 and 414,266, respectively.

It added that most residents departed through sea and land immigration control points.

Simon Wong Ka-wo, the president of the Hong Kong Federation of Restaurants, stated that the figures reflected most of the locals prefer to head to the mainland for weekends, while few people are choosing to visit Hong Kong.

He said the situation was worrying and showed that the effect of night economy promotions was limited and local businesses could be on the receiving end.

The catering veteran added that during the National Day holiday, the daily business of the catering industry was about HK$400 million, but it has declined since then and the market atmosphere in the past two weeks was not ideal. 

He stressed that the purchasing power going north could heavily hamper the recovery of the catering and retail sectors.