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A total of 450,000 Chinese mainland tourists visited Hong Kong between Oct. 1 and 7, or the National Day "Golden Week" and their shopping targets have become more diversified.

The strong inflows of the Chinese mainland visitor have brought about a surge of about 20 percent of sales volume in quite a number of shops in the downtown areas.

Yu Pang-chun, director of Hong Kong Retail Management Association (HKRMA), said though the per capita spending of tourists is less than the expected 5,000 HK dollars (641 US dollars), the increase of the number of tourists compensated parts of the "decline".

The popular shopping malls and chain stores such as Times Square and Sasa Cosmetics benefited much from the strong inflow of visitors.

Germaine Lui, promotion and advertising department of Times Square Limited told Xinhua that Times Square received 15,000 more Chinese mainland customers than usual during the "Golden Week" and their per capita spending in the shopping mall was about 5,000 Hong Kong dollars.

Sasa Cosmetics, a chain shop that many Chinese mainland customers are familiar with, also witnessed about 25 percent growth of its sales volume.

According to Travel Industry of Hong Kong, most of the Chinese mainland tourists during the "Golden Week" were from Hong Kong's neighboring Guangdong Province and "near neighbor" Fujian Province.Quite a lot of them have already come to Hong Kong for shopping, so they did not choose to buy high-priced goods such as domestic electrical appliance and diamonds this time while buying some daily goods instead.

Apart from brand cosmetic products, digital cameras, fashions, leather product, which have been favorites of Chinese mainland tourists, herbal medicine, milk powder, health products also become the shopping targets of many tourists.

Apart from shopping and sight-seeing, some tourists came all the way to Hong Kong to meet relatives and friends and some young ladies even visited match-making agencies, in hope for a satisfactory marriage.

As for the hotel industry, the average hotel room occupancy rate during the holidays was 70 percent to 80 percent, less than the expected number. Quite a number of visitors, especially those from Guangdong Province, paid a one-day shopping visit to Hong Kong to save money.

However, Jerry Miao, resident manager of JW Marriott Hong Kong hotel said in an interview with Xinhua that he was quite satisfied with the hotel's business.

He said the room occupancy rate of the JW Mariiott Hong Kong during the "Golden Week" was about 81 percent to 82 percent which was already higher than the average rate in the chain five-star hotels in the United States.

He said, the five-star has witnessed the residing of three percentage more Chinese mainland businessmen or tourists since the beginning of this year. In a bid to enhance its competitiveness and attract more passengers, JW Marriott Hong Kong renovated and reopened Friday a Loung and Q88 Wine Bar with an investment of 9.5million.

Looking ahead, Miao is even more optimistic. He said the hotel rooms of JW Marriott Hong Kong and several other five-star hotels for next week have been nearly fully occupied as a number of trade fairs and business activities have been arranged for next week.

He said, though the "Golden Week" was over, more business opportunities will come with the implementation of Chinese Mainland/Hong Kong Closer Economic Partnership Arrangement (CEPA) and the coming of more Chinese mainland enterprises for promotion in Hong Kong, as businessmen are the main source of the five-star hotel.
 
Editor: Olivia