The appointment signals ambition in the UK market even as the territory’s political reputation remains a challenge for tourism messaging
HKTB Makes UK Appointment as Tourism Push Intensifies
The Hong Kong Tourism Board has named Joelle Watkins as its Senior Manager for Trade Marketing in the UK and Northern Europe. Watkins, who will be based in London, brings experience from senior roles at Flight Centre, Travelport, and Emirates. She will be responsible for leading trade marketing strategy and partnerships across the UK and Northern Europe, working with travel agents, tour operators, airlines, and industry partners to drive awareness and demand for Hong Kong as a destination. The appointment comes at a moment when the HKTB is investing significantly in recovering visitor numbers following the combined impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, the political disruptions of 2019 and 2020, and the resulting decline in long-haul arrivals from Western markets.
Why the UK Market Matters
The United Kingdom has a uniquely layered relationship with Hong Kong. As the former colonial power, the UK administered the territory until the 1997 handover and retains cultural, educational, and family ties that make it one of the most emotionally engaged foreign markets for Hong Kong tourism. British National Overseas passport holders, of whom there are hundreds of thousands, maintain the right to live and work in the UK. The large community of recent Hong Kong arrivals who have taken up residence in British cities maintains strong connections to family and friends still in the territory, driving a pattern of visits that is distinct from conventional tourism.
The Marketing Challenge: Honesty and Aspiration
Watkins’ appointment comes with a significant challenge that no amount of trade marketing strategy can fully resolve. Hong Kong’s international reputation has been profoundly damaged by the events of 2019 and their aftermath. The images of tear gas in the streets, of pro-democracy protesters being arrested, of Jimmy Lai being dragged from his editorial office, of Apple Daily’s printing presses falling silent, are not easily overwritten by destination marketing campaigns emphasising Hong Kong’s food, its hiking trails, and its shopping. Reporters Without Borders ranks Hong Kong near the bottom of its global press freedom index. That is the context in which any tourism promotion campaign operates.
What Hong Kong Still Offers Visitors
None of this changes the fact that Hong Kong remains a genuinely extraordinary place to visit. Its urban landscape, squeezed between harbour and steep green hills, is among the most dramatic in the world. Its food culture, blending Cantonese tradition with international influences accumulated over a century and a half of cosmopolitan openness, is without peer in Asia. Its night markets, its temples, its hiking trails through the country parks that cover more than forty percent of the territory, and its extraordinary density of experience packed into a small geographic area make it compelling for the adventurous traveller. Visit Hong Kong, the official tourism portal, provides genuinely useful guidance for travellers planning a visit, covering everything from Cantonese food culture to hiking routes and arts venues.
The Travel Agent Relationship
Watkins’ role focuses specifically on trade marketing: building relationships with travel agents and tour operators who package and sell Hong Kong to the UK consumer. This is a distribution challenge as much as a brand challenge. Independent travellers can research and book their own Hong Kong trips. Package travellers, particularly older consumers and families, rely on agents to recommend and curate destinations. Rebuilding agent confidence in Hong Kong as a safe, rewarding, recommendable destination is a legitimate commercial task, distinct from the deeper political questions about the territory’s future.
Tourism as a Human Bridge
There is a case to be made that encouraging UK citizens to visit Hong Kong serves a purpose beyond the commercial. Every British tourist who visits the city, eats in a local restaurant, hires a local guide, and forms personal impressions of its people and their lives is a potential witness to the reality on the ground. Hong Kong Watch has argued that international attention matters for the people of Hong Kong and that engagement, rather than isolation, gives the city’s remaining democratic community some protection through visibility. Tourism is not a substitute for political accountability. But it is not nothing either.
Watkins’ Challenge and Opportunity
Joelle Watkins takes on a role that requires both commercial skill and cultural sensitivity. She is selling a destination that is genuinely magnificent and genuinely troubled, and she will need to navigate that reality with care. The Hongkongers who remain in the city, and those who have left, deserve a tourism narrative that does not erase the complexity of what the city is living through. The best version of this appointment is one that brings genuine visitors who see Hong Kong honestly and carry its story home with them.
