S’wak receives more Chinese tourists
SARAWAK recorded a total of 34,102 tourist arrivals from China between January to September this year.
Tourism, Arts, Culture, Youth and Sports Minister Datuk Abdul Karim Rahman Hamzah said this encouraging figure marked an increase of 15.78 per cent compared to the corresponding period in 2017.
“This is attributed to the Kuching- Shenzhen direct flight and marketing campaigns for China market,” he said in his ministerial winding-up speech at the State Legislative Assembly ( DUN) Sitting yesterday.
Apart from China, he noted that Singapore tourists also indicated an increase of 10.84 per cent from January to September this year.
“This was due to aggressive Singapore marketing campaign and the availability of more than 600 seats daily offered by Malaysia Airlines, AirAsia and Scoot Airlines.”
Though China and Singapore recorded increase of tourist arrivals, the state nevertheless saw a decrease in visitor arrivals at 3,230,201 (13.27 per cent) as compared to the corresponding period in 2017.
The top five source of visitors for Sarawak were Brunei Darussalam at 1,008,156 (decrease of 25.95 per cent), Indonesia at 312,307 (down 21.86 per cent), the Philippines at 43,688 (down 16.74 per cent), China at 34,102 (increase of 15.78 per cent) and Singapore at 33,326 (up 10.84 per cent).
Nevertheless, Abdul Karim is optimistic that Sarawak visitor arrivals and national tourist arrivals is expected to reach 4.5 million generating some RM8.05 billion in tourism receipts based on performance and trend for the past few months.
“With the launching of Visit Sarawak Campaign, my ministry will be proactive in delivering our mission to position Sarawak as a premier tourism destination and we expect to receive 5 million visitor arrivals in 2019.”