Melaka eyes up to RM5m from tourism tax

MELAKA: The state government hopes get an allocation of between RM3 million and RM5 million once the collection of the tourism tax kicks off next month.

State Tourism, River and Coastal Development Committee deputy chairman Datuk Ghazale Muhamad said Melaka, being a Unesco World Heritage Site, was one of the important states contributing to the country’s tourism revenue, with 698 tourism products offered this year.

“Every year, the number of tourists coming to Melaka is increasing. We are confident that we will achieve our target of 16.75 million tourist arrivals by yearend, because we have achieved 7.57 million tourist arrivals for the first half of the year,” he said yesterday.

Ghazale said last year, Melaka contributed 60.8 per cent of the nation’s tourist arrivals, with a record of 16.28 million tourist arrivals in the state out of 26.76 million tourist arrivals in the country.

He stressed on the importance of maintaining heritage products in the state to continuously welcome tourists.

“The three largest nations contributing to Melaka tourist arrivals are China, Indonesia and Singapore. We do not want any of our tourist products to lag behind, which is why we need to maintain the state’s heritage infrastructure.”

He said existing facilities must be improved to accommodate more tourists.

He said he expected the maintenance of heritage products to go up with any increase in tourist arrivals and the mushrooming of new hotels in the state.