China is restricting some travel to Hong Kong due to a significant increase in the number of cross-border mainland Chinese travellers to the Asian financial hub, according to the official Chinese news agency, Xinhua.

Under the new rules, residents of the nearby city of Shenzhen are no longer permitted to visit Hong Kong multiple times per week. Instead, the public security bureau in the border city will issue only once-per-week travel passes.

The aim of the new policy is to ease the flow of mainland tourists in the former British colony and to “target the career parallel traders,” said Leung Chun-ying, Hong Kong chief executive, according to Bloomberg. Parallel traders are cross-border shoppers that resell goods back in mainland China for a profit.

According to the Chinese central government, the travel policy was implemented because “alongside the increasing growth of mainland residents travelling to Hong Kong and growing pressure on mainland and Hong Kong immigration ports, there’s growing contradiction between visitor numbers to Hong Kong and Hong Kong tourism’s capability,” stated the Xinhua report.

Of the approximately 4.6 million people who travelled to Hong Kong more than once a week last year, 30 per cent were residents from Shenzhen with multiple entry permits, according to Leung. A Reuters report reveals nearly 47 million mainland Chinese visitors visited Hong Kong in 2014 — more than six times the population of the former British colony.

Despite the new travel restriction for Shenzhen residents, “Hong Kong is still a city for tourists from all around the world including those from the mainland,” said Leung.

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