Hong Kong's tourism industry enjoyed further healthy growth in February 2005 with over 1.74 million visitor arrivals, the Hong Kong Tourism Board (HKTB) said Friday.

This is comfortably the best February result on record, surpassing the 1.45 million arrivals in February 2004 by over 290, 000, or 20 percent.

HKTB Executive Director Clara Chong said Lunar new year has become a more and more popular time to visit Hong Kong for leisure, as evidenced by double-digit growth in key markets including the Philippines, Britain, Singapore and some other countries.

She believed that this is due to the growing reputation of the International Lunar New Year Parade and determined efforts of the HKTB and its trade partners to package the festival activities attractively to family travelers worldwide.

The Hong Kong Special 2005-2006 Financial Budget proposed 500 million HK dollars (64.1 million US dollars) for tourism promotion and the HKTB will launch more tourism promotion activities to attract tourists worldwide.

So far, a number of large tourism projects are underway of construction in Hong Kong and the Hong Kong Disneyland will open to the public on Sept. 12.

Source: Xinhua