Should HK limit overtourism?

Michael Chugani October 13, 2025 09:35

Driving south from Seattle in the US west coast state of Washington to the neighboring state of Oregon offers a spectacular view of the Pacific Ocean. My family and I did that most summers when I lived in Seattle years ago. We stopped to admire the many remote beaches on our way to a small Oregon coastal town called Yachats where we stayed at a comfortable motel with only two floors that had balconies overlooking the ocean.

We often explored the shoreline at low tide during our stay to look at the corals and numerous marine creatures, including crabs, sea urchins, clams, and mussels. We and other tourists did not step on the corals or interfered with marine life. People either took pictures or observed the creatures in tide pools during low tide while preserving nature's beauty. US law prohibits interfering with, picking up, or taking home marine life.

Compare that with what happened on the October, 1 National Day when over 4,000 mainland tourists flooded Sharp Island's Geopark. Some stepped on corals, dug up marine creatures such as clams, starfish, and sea urchins. Others started fires to cook while many left piles of rubbish. Greenpeace released startling pictures of the environmental damage caused to the geopark.

I was astonished when two senior officials, Secretary for Environment and Ecology Tse Chin-wan and Deputy Director of the Agriculture, Fisheries, and Conservation Department Patrick Lai Chuen-chi, told the media the ecological damage was not significant. The two officials should know any damage, minor or major, to the UNESCO-listed site is cause for concern and unacceptable.

As someone who believes in the importance of protecting the environment, I was pained when I saw the Greenpeace pictures and media reports. Hong Kong is lucky to be surrounded by natural beauty. Its harbor is rated as among the world's most breathtaking. The Peak has spectacular views of the harbor, outlying islands, and mountains.

The country parks are easily reachable yet provide a scenic and serene getaway from the crowds and noise of the city. Its vast UNESCO-designated Geopark in Sai Kung is nature's gift to Hong Kong. It is the duty of every Hongkonger to protect these natural assets. The government has a responsibility to remind visitors to do the same.

As a Hong Kong-born, I take pride in the city's many natural attractions, its status as a food capital, excellent public transport system, and HK Disneyland, which boasts the world's first World of Frozen attraction. That new attraction alone, which I thoroughly enjoyed, warrants a trip to Hong Kong. Every city nowadays is trying hard to attract tourists, including Hong Kong. Some have been so successful, such as Italy and Japan, that they now suffer from overtourism and are taking measures to deal with it.

Hong Kong, a tiny city, has its own overtourism problem, not with high-spending mainland or foreign visitors but budget travelers from the mainland who overnight at McDonald's or camp at beaches instead of paying for hotel rooms. Some even illegally camped at Sharp Island's Geopark. Is this the kind of overtourism Hong Kong needs? About 1.4 million mainland tourists visited during the National Day Golden Week.

The government likes to take pride in publishing such numbers, believing quantity matters more than quality. Hong Kong’s proximity to the Greater Bay Area combined with its numerous and convenient cross-border transport and infrastructure links means there are very limited options to deal with overtourism. I am not suggesting Hong Kong should stop welcoming mainland budget travelers. The city thrives on its open policy. But maybe the government should consider resuming the past policy of one visit per week to manage overtourism better.

Friends tell me the mainland's troubled economy no longer produces the wealthy tourists who used to line up at name-brand stores on Canton Road or Russell Street, which is why many of those stores have shuttered. I don't buy that. The mainland's 1.4 billion population still has numerous high-spending tourists, but they prefer Japan, South Korea, and Europe. Hong Kong needs to ask itself why it is not getting a bigger piece of this pie.

It has tried to diversify with so-called night, panda, yacht, night vibes, halal, and other economies. That effort deserves credit, but none has taken off in any meaningful way. Policymakers can't seem to see the forest for the trees. Promoting different types of economy is a piecemeal approach. The trees need to be merged into a forest

Places such as Japan, South Korea, and France have their own soft power, including Mt Fuji, K-pop, and the Louvre. Hong Kong cannot compete on that level. But it can maximize its own unique soft power to attract high-spending mainland and foreign tourists.

Too little is being done to promote Aberdeen's historic fishing village and sampan rides, Lamma Island's fresh seafood restaurants, Sheung Wan's historic streets, the bridge to Macau and Zhuhai, one of the world's longest, and the city's proximity to Macau's casinos and nightlife, which rivals Las Vegas. Hong Kong was always able to reinvent itself, especially during colonial days. What happened?

Michael Chugani

A Hong Kong-born American citizen who has worked for many years as a journalist in Hong Kong, the USA and London.