Business

The tourism industry has been devastated since the outbreak of COVID-19. The number of visitors to Hong Kong dropped drastically by 99.9 per cent year-on-year, as mentioned earlier by Mr Edward Yau, the Secretary for Commerce and Economic Development.  Since the government relaxed the social distancing ban last week, many travel agencies started to organize local tours. At the same time, the Hong Kong tourism board relaunched the "Hello Hong Kong" scheme to help the sector.  The board offers free tours for the citizens who spend HK$800 or more on the local brick-and-mortar shops, including retail stores and restaurants. It is estimated that the government will subsidize the travel agencies in total HK$5 million on a selective basis. While some travel agencies find the policies effective for their recovery, some think the policies did little in relieving the plight of the tour operators. Sue Tsang, the customer service officer of the China Travel Service, said there is popular demand for the campaign, and it directly brings business opportunities to domestic tourism.  The number of tourists who sign up for other locally escorted tours remains limited. For the sake of overcoming the difficult times, China Travel Service also promotes discounted prepaid coupons and staycation packages.  "I have to stretch my legs. Although the local tour is not my priority, it is still a choice," said Eric Cheung, a middle-aged man who intends to enquire about international tours in the travel agency, chose to join local tours instead. Although the government has reopened the border, executed measures such as local inbound tours, the agencies' staff reckon that it is still unable to save those agencies which are on the verge of collapse. "There is no room for survival if the government does not implement new rules for cross-border tourism," said Wong Ka-lam, …

The 3-day Restaurant & Bar Hong Kong X Gourmet Asia exhibition at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre ended on Nov. 13. Once postponed due to COVID-19, the Restaurant & Bar Hong Kong X Gourmet Asia exhibition was the only trade show for Hong Kong's food and beverage industry this year. Over 270 exhibitors and brands were participating in this event presenting spirits and beer; food service and catering equipment; hospitality design and supplies, as well as hospitality technology. The exhibition adopted hygienic precautions amid the pandemic. According to the posters and leaflets inside the venue, people were required to wear masks at all times and keep a safe distance of 1 meter when in queues. Buyers were asked to dispose of used lidded paper cups in a designed rubbish bin. Liang Jia, a 29-year old wholesale buyer who sought to buy meat said she felt the rules and measures were stricter compared to last year. She felt it is inconvenient to toss the trash into the designated bin since the bins were located far from each stall. Some exhibitors made their products specifically to cater to the time of the pandemic. Sales manager Twinkle Wong from BBPOS, a payment service provider, introduced their new vending machine without human contacts in the purchasing process. She believed that the risk of being infected would be reduced. "COVID-19 has shown the society the need for zero-contact ordering and payment methods in the food and beverage industry," Ms Wong said, adding that this was the debut of the machine in Hong Kong. The pandemic has raised the need among consumers to live a healthy and green life, which leads to strong demands for natural and organic products. Sales representative Winnie Choi from Green Common, a vegan product company, said they have seen …

Turning on the laptop, connecting to Shadowsocks, and then accessing Google. These are the necessary steps for some students in mainland China to complete their homework every day. During the outbreak of the coronavirus, many mainland students enrolled in colleges in Hong Kong have to stay in the mainland. In order to take online classes and complete course assignments, they need to scale the so-called Great Firewall, a virtual online barrier that keeps people in China out of specific foreign websites. Using Virtual Private Networks such as Shadowsocks, is a way to gain access to the uncensored Internet. Since the early 2000s, China has gradually blocked a large number of overseas websites including Google and Facebook. In recent years, the government has turned up the heat in its  control of the network so that VPNs have become more and more vital for people to cross the Great Firewall. Here is a guide to what you may want to know about VPN in China. What is VPN? VPN routes your device's internet connection through a private server rather than your Internet Service Provider. That way, it masks the identity of your device because all of your data will appear to come from a private server and enables you to operate data that can only be operated through the private network. By using VPN, software running on a computer or a mobile phone can gain some rights that only a private network has, such as security and some specific function such as internal resources of an organization. Take The Young Reporter for example, as a student publication the portal of TYR can only be logged in and managed when the user's device is connected to the university's network. In order to operate the portal remotely, editors need to use a VPN so …

Staying fit while under home quarantine because of the pandemic is a challenge for some, and not doing exercise may only worsen the cabin fever. So turning to Ring Fit Adventure maybe one solution. The fitness video game from Nintendo, a Japanese games and electronic company, topped the sale charts in Japan, America and Europe, with over 170 million copies sold in late February, after being released for five months. Ring Fit Adventure was launched at a price of 7980 yen, which is approximately 577 Hong Kong dollars. However, as demand soared since the coronavirus outbreak, the price jumped more than threefolds to around 2100 Hong Kong dollars at its highest point in February. The price of the game has risen rapidly since mid January in mainland China as well. According to Daniel Ahmad, a senior analyst at a gaming market research company, Chinese sellers are buying overseas game sets at the list price and reselling them for around 2200 Hong Kong dollars. He thinks that the huge price difference is due to global shortage. In Weibo, there are 10.2 million discussions under the topic of Ring Fit Adventures. Short videos and thoughts regarding the game are shared. Nintendo even had to apologize for the shortage, as shut down of factories in China affected the supply. On Nintendo's official website, the game experience is described as "Explore fantasy adventure worlds to defeat monsters using real-life exercises". In the adventure mode in Ring Fit, users are required to mirror the poses shown to defeat monsters. The poses are sorted into four main categories, each meant to train a specific body part. For example, under the "leg" category, users need to do squats, mountain climber and side steps. Claudia Cheng, 24, bought the game after the start of the epidemic. "As I …