Hong Kong launches 'smile offensive' to boost flagging tourism

Five years after the world watched pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong meet with fierce repression, authorities in the territory think they have worked out how to get tourists back – everyone needs to smile more.

Hong Kong's tourist board has launched a campaign to promote courtesy and good service towards visitors, said Hong Kong Free Press. Starring actors Louis Koo and Ng Siu-hin, it aims to show "how we can all better demonstrate the hospitality by going the extra mile with small gestures".

But with much of the messaging targeted at hospitality and service workers, not everyone is convinced the plan is effective or fair. And the timing of the launch – the fifth anniversary of a huge protest against a security bill that allowed Hong Kong residents to be extradited for trial in mainland China – has also raised eyebrows.

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'Black sheep' 

"Unfriendly" staff at restaurants were "once viewed as a charming hallmark" of Hong Kong, said Time, but the phenomenon has increasingly been described as a "turn-off" for tourists. A survey about the city's taxi service last year also found that "rudeness" was customers' top complaint.

Culture, sports and tourism secretary Kevin Yeung blamed a "handful of black sheep" for the impolite behaviour that "tarnishes our image".

The tourism industry is also experiencing major shortages of experienced staff, because those who were laid off or returned to their home countries during the pandemic haven't yet returned.

Yeung has announced a three-pronged approach, with the Education Bureau promoting programmes to teach courtesy to students, while the Home Affairs Department will organise community activities to encourage friendliness, with rewards on offer for "good performance". Yeung hopes that the more smiley attitude and mentality can become a "part of daily life", making tourists "feel like they are at home", reported Says.

Lending his support to the campaign, Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu asked all residents to take part, to "enhance" visitors' experiences. "We should be more courteous, we should be more helpful, we should smile more," he said.

'Celebrity nudging'

It's certainly true that Hong Kong has a tourism problem. Data from the Hong Kong Census and Statistics Department and Tourism Board show that the city saw a peak of more than 6.7 million monthly visitor arrivals in January 2019, but by April 2024 it was attracting less than half that number.

The recovery of its tourism sector since the pandemic "lags behind" other nearby destinations like Indonesia, Japan, Thailand and Singapore, said the ASEAN+3 macroeconomic research office. That's partly due to Hong Kong's "heavy reliance" on tourists from mainland China, who "held off travelling abroad after the pandemic", and partly due to the visa-free travel offered by Malaysia, Thailand and Singapore to "lure mainland visitors". The appreciation of the Hong Kong dollar against other regional currencies has also had a "discouraging effect". 

Long-haul tourists are also not returning in the same numbers because airlines have yet to restore the number of Hong Kong flights to pre-pandemic levels, said Hong Kong Free Press, which has in turn driven up the prices of remaining flights. 

But Beijing's draconian security legislation has also had a negative impact. The US, Canada and Australia have all issued travel advisory warnings for Hong Kong, citing "arbitrary" laws. 

After more harsh security legislation was passed in March, Australia updated its warning on Hong Kong: "You could be detained without charge for up to 16 days and denied access to a lawyer for up to 48 hours."

The tourism board has a "tough job of restoring Hong Kong’s allure as a tourist destination", said Annika Park in the South China Morning Post. But "rallying a cavalcade of picture-perfect celebrities to wag fingers at frontline service staff" is "not the right answer".

She is "most curious to know if any of the celebrities on the call sheet for the ads has ever worked a service role". Instead of "heaping expectations on minimum-wage workers", what if the stars "donned dirty aprons for a day to engage and empathise with the realities of frontline restaurant work?"