The Macao Government Tourism Office (MGTO) is reintroducing, from Thursday (May 1), a special offer of free one-way ferry tickets from Hong Kong to Macau, for international visitors. The bureau is also renewing its campaign offering free, one-way tickets for direct buses linking Hong Kong International Airport with the Macau checkpoint of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge.
MGTO expects the two campaigns to encourage side trips to Macau by transit travellers and others visiting neighbouring Hong Kong.
The scheme was first launched last year. From February to December 2024, more than 310,000 international visitors made use of it, according to a press release issued by MGTO on Tuesday, announcing the scheme’s reintroduction.
Both offers are available only to people from “beyond the Greater China region,” MGTO stated.
The initiative aims to “expand the diversity of visitor source markets” to Macau.
The free one-way ticket offer is available from May 1 to December 31.
Macau welcomed approximately 34.93 million visitors in 2024, according to data from the city’s Statistics and Census Service. Of those, just over 2.42 million were international travellers – i.e., from outside mainland China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan – an increase of approximately 66 percent year-on-year.
The Macau government has a stated policy aim of encouraging its casino concessionaires to draw more of their customers from markets beyond China.
As part of the Macau government’s 2022 tender process for new 10-year gaming concessions, bidders were asked to create plans and pledge investment on a number of issues, including bringing in more customers from overseas.
