ABSTRACT
In many ways, SARS could not have hit Hong Kong at a worse time (see Wong et al., 2004). All of a sudden, the hint of optimism was shattered. Domestic economic activity ground to a near halt as restaurants and shops were deserted. This was bad enough but it was then followed by the ( nal straw. ‘It quickly became apparent that the mainland SARS outbreak could be worse than had previously been imagined – and this was followed by the revelation that Taiwan was also similarly affected . . . As more and more E ights were cancelled, the lifeblood seemed to be draining out of the virtuous economic triangle that ties together Hong Kong, Taiwan and mainland China’ (Brown, 2004: 190). Passenger arrivals by land and air collapsed and tourism dried up. Cathay Paci( c cut its scheduled passenger E ights by over 80 per cent and throughput at the Hong Kong airport fell by
80 per cent. Some hotels had less than ten rooms occupied at the height of the crisis (Brown, 2004). How would its hotel industry survive in face of the drastic plunge of average hotel occupancy rates which fell from 83 per cent to 18 per cent, when compared to the same months in 2002? We shall shortly see that – ex post facto – the industry did survive, but only because it took drastic steps to tighten its belt.
