Chinese wary of Sri Lanka, holiday elsewhere

Sri Lanka’s tourist arrivals gained in January by 12 per cent but saw a significant drop in Chinese visitors to the country for the month. Chinese arrivals saw a sharp drop of 22 per cent last month compared to the same period in 2017.

Interestingly the Chinese market has been faced with a number of issues lately and some tour operators opine that the traditional lifestyles of these people were hindered when they holiday in Sri Lanka.

A sizeable number of Chinese travellers are smokers and when arriving in Colombo they are not permitted to bring in their cigarettes and liquor, a restriction placed based on a government regulation, travel agents said.

Moreover, it was also pointed out that even during certain periods like the Chinese New Year ( on February 16) there is limitation on airline capacity as more and more Chinese travel the world.

An increase in frequencies during this period and greater access with increased capacity on airlines is a requirement that needs to be worked out, travel agents state.

Moreover, tour operators believe that the absence of promotions in important cities in China has also contributed to the slide in tourist arrivals last month.

Chinese travellers are targeted by tour operators worldwide that increasingly cater to their demands and are found to holiday in some of the tourist hot spots within Asia with Sri Lanka notably an excep- tion going by the January numbers.

Moreover, tour operators explained that in the absence of adequate promotions and marketing by the government in the different destinations, they need to engage in promotions along with the tour operators.

In this regard, other countries carry out destination marketing promotions along with their respective tour operators in support of them with one-to-one and joint promotion which is not the case in Sri Lanka.

This, certain sections of the industry believe, needs to be worked out with the authorities, it was pointed out.

Some destination marketing companies (DMCs) however have a misconception that this type of marketing would only help the larger companies and not the small ones.

This system was in progress in the past but due to this facility being misused it was halted.

The graph indicates the Chinese arrivals pattern from January 2015 to January 2018. This clearly shows that the months of January have shown increased arrivals but in January 2018 the numbers have for the first time dropped. The top 10 countries that...