Sarawak govt, Redefine Tourism Mixer to further promote tourism
KUCHING: Sarawak government will work together with nongovernmental organisation Redefine Tourism Mixer (RTM) to further promote the state’s tourism industry.
RTM, led by its founder and chief executive officer, Daniel Cheng has successfully helped to develop many parts of the world into tourism products.
“It has successfully helped to develop Linbian Township in Pintung County in Taiwan, Danang and Hawaii into successful tourism destinations.
“We cannot put tourism aside because it is a major revenue earner in many countries of the world,” he said at the opening of the Smart,Smart Destination Forum at UCSI Hotel yesterday.
Meanwhile, Minister of Tourism, Arts, Culture, Youth and Sports Datuk Abdul Karim Rahman Hamzah, who had the honour to declare open the forum, said tourism was not a subject matter that was discussed at the formation of Malaysia in 1963, which meant it is a state matter but in 1994 it was placed under the federal list.
“Therefore, we are not going to depend on the present federal government or Malaysia Tourism Board because we do not have control over tourism.”
He also lamented the drastic drop in the allocation of funds to develop tourism in Sarawak after the Pakatan Harapan government took over as the federal government.
“Last year, the money given to my ministry was only RM150,000 when compared to millions in the previous years.”
Abdul Karim said the Sarawak government would focus on hosting major music events such as Rainforest World Music Festival at the Sarawak Cultural Village in Santubong, Miri Jazz Festival and the Kuching Waterfront Jazz Festival. Sarawak would also organise many international sports events.
However, he said Sarawak was still facing many challenges in attracting tourists from all over the world to come and spend their holidays here simply because of air connectivity and accessibility issues.
“These are among the perennial issues but we simply cannot give up. My ministry together with agencies such as Sarawak Tourism Board ( STB) and Sarawak Convention Bureau (SCB) believe in working closely with the local stakeholders and sharing of resources that will advance our tourism and hospitality industry.
“This is important especially now when the world is seemingly getting smaller because of technology advancement and innovative approaches in communicating with one another,” he added.
Abdul Karim also said he was pleased to note that since the launch of the Visit Sarawak Campaign four months ago, it was fast gaining traction with many tourists from other parts of the country and overseas coming into Sarawak.
“Presently, the number of visitors to Sarawak especially from the Peninsula has dramatically increased by 68 per cent compared to the figure in January 2018. The overall arrivals have also increased by 10.72per centor 326,347 visitors.
“We hope to sustain this growth in the coming months through the use of different marketing strategies in pushing the Sarawak brand to the global tourism map, and hopefully we can achieve the target of having 5 million tourists sooner than expected.”
On the forum, he said it was good because it was aimed at enhancing Sarawak as a tourist destination to the target market with effective positioning strategy as well as providing platforms for the sharing, networking, collaboration and business opportunities among the participants.
USCI University Sarawak Campus CEO Mukvinder Sandhu, Faculty of Hospitality and Tourism Management deputy dean Assistant Professor Christopher Wan, and Sarawak Research Society chairman assistant Professor Dr Hiram Ting were among those present.