With the dominance of a dry northeast monsoon over southern China, January was marked by dry and sunny weather, the Hong Kong Observatory (HKO) said today.

The monthly total sunshine duration amounted to 222.3 hours, about 52% above the norm.

Only 4.2mm of rainfall was recorded in the month, about 13% of the norm.

The month was also slightly warmer than usual with a mean temperature of 17.1 degrees Celsius, 0.6 degrees above the norm, the HKO added.