HONG KONG -- The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region saw a steady recovery in incoming visitors in 2023 boosted by a resumption of normal travel between the city and the Chinese mainland, official data showed Thursday.

The total number of visitor arrivals was around 34 million in 2023, representing a rise of 55 times as compared with that of 2022, of which Chinese mainland visitor arrivals were around 26.76 million, the immigration department of the HKSAR government said.

A total of around 212 million passengers passed through Hong Kong's control points, representing a rise of 39 times over 2022. In general, the total number of passengers passing through Hong Kong's control points in 2023 recovered to 70 percent of that in 2019, the immigration department said.

To support the HKSAR government's initiatives to attract talent from outside Hong Kong, the department has continued to enhance talent admission schemes, with the number of applications under various schemes increasing significantly last year.

The number of applications under all sorts of talent admission schemes surpassed 220,000, with around 135,000 of them approved, and about 90,000 people with approved visas have arrived in Hong Kong, the department said.