Cross-border traffic drops 90% in April

THE restrictions imposed over Covid-19 quarantine measures have caused the cross-border traffic in and out of Macau to drop by 89.5% in April this year when compared with the same period last year, according to figures released by the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC).

According to the official statistics, the total number of cross-border trips recorded in April 2020 was only 45,707; a figure very far from the approximately 450,000 recorded in April 2019.

The statistics from DSEC included not only the traffic from private vehicles but also coach services to and from Zhuhai and Hong Kong as well as transportation of goods via logistics companies.

April figures added to the already-poor first quarter results, making the first four months of the year responsible for a drop by 53% year-on-year to a total of 805,684 trips.

Meanwhile, the arrival and departure of commercial flights at the Macau International Airport decreased by 97.3% year-on-year to just 162 trips in April, and also recorded a fall by 63.3% year-on-year to 8,573 trips in the first four months of 2020.

The airport handled 1,515 tons of air cargo in April, a figure that also represented a drop year-on-year of 56.4%.

In the first quarter of 2020, air cargo transportation reached only 7,916 tons, down by 34.7% when compared with the same period of 2019.

Conversely, the gross weight of containerized cargo transported by land increased in April by 64.1% year-on-year to 2,167 tons. On the other hand, the gross weight of port containerized cargo decreased by 33.5% to 7,435 tons, with the cargo handled at the Ká-hó Port decreasing by 85.4% and cargo shipped through the Inner Harbour rising by 14.4%.

In the first four months of 2020, the gross weight of containerized cargo by land increased by 24.7% year-on-year to 7,244 tons, whereas that of port containerized cargo dropped by 28.9% to 33,873 tons.