Malaysia first to promote ‘Salam Taiwan’

GEORGE TOWN: A group of delegates from the Taiwan Tourism Bureau (TTB) has chosen Malaysia as the first country to promote its ‘Salam Taiwan’ programme aimed at boosting Muslim tourists’ arrivals in that country.

Director of TTB Kuala Lumpur, Abe Chou said ‘Salam Taiwan’ was the first Muslimfriendly tourism campaign in the country which was in line with the Taiwan government’s effort in recent years of actively promoting the policy of a friendly environment for Muslim tourists.

“We received more than 526,000 tourists from Malaysia in 2018, where 15 per cent of them were Muslims. We believe with this (Salam Taiwan) approach, the number will grow and Malaysians will make up the highest number of Muslim visitors to Taiwan.

“Taiwan now has more than 200 halal-certified restaurants and hotels, while most scenic attractions and transportation hubs have prayer rooms, and there are more specalised travel itineraries for Muslims,” he told reporters after making a presentation at the Taiwan Tourism Workshop 2019, here, yesterday.

Meanwhile, Chinese Muslim Association of Taiwan secretary-general, Salahudin Ma said Muslim tourists had nothing to worry about when visiting Taiwan.

He said many facilities had been built and prepared to accommodate Muslim tourists and the association had also developed an application, Halal.TW, available in several languages including Malay, to guide the tourists while in Taiwan.

“Apart from building more mosques and prayer rooms, we will try our best to help Muslim tourists feel comfortable while in Taiwan where halal hotels and restaurants also provide the direction of the Qiblah, prayer mats, Quran, prayer timetable, and many more,” he said.

Ma said Muslim tourism had been in an upward trend lately and even non-Muslim entrepreneurs in Taiwan, aware of the market potential, were also interested in joining the promotion.

“The population of Muslims in Taiwan is very small... just around 60,000 compared to Taiwan’s total population of 23.58 million. With this campaign, at least 30 per cent of economic growth is expected for the Muslim economy in Taiwan,” he added. - Bernama