The Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) today released preliminary tourism arrival statistics for Asia and the Pacific for calendar year 2010, showing a gain of 11 per cent year-on-year. Compared to the corresponding month in 2009, the number of international arrivals in December 2010 was seven per cent higher, it said.
South Asia reported the strongest sub-regional arrivals growth for the year with an aggregate gain of 14 per cent reaching an inbound volume count of just over 8.4-million. India, which captures 70 per cent of the total foreign arrivals to the sub-region, posted a strong nine per cent increase to set a new record of 5.6-million foreign inbound visits for the year.
Similarly, Sri Lanka (up by 46 per cent), the Maldives (up by 21 per cent) and Nepal (up by 19 per cent) -- that is encouraging for a country that is celebrating Nepal Tourism Year -- each set new records in terms of visitor volumes on even stronger growth performances last year, according to the report.
International arrivals to Southeast Asia were 12 per cent higher for 2010 compared to a year earlier, reaching a volume count of more than 72-million. All destinations in the sub-region set new arrivals records, with growth in traffic to Vietnam (up by 35 per cent), Singapore (up by 20 per cent), the Philippines (up by 17 per cent) and Thailand (up by 12 per cent) being particularly impressive.
Northeast Asia posted full-year arrivals growth of 11 per cent, reaching a foreign inbound volume of more than 218-million. The strong full-year performances were driven by solid results from Chinese Taipei (up by 27 per cent), Japan (up by 27 per cent), Hong Kong (up by 22 per cent), Mongolia (up by 20 per cent) and Korea (up by 13 per cent), with all of these setting new records. Macau posted a strong 2010 year-end result (up by 15 per cent) but is still a little behind the inbound count of 27-million set in 2007.
Growth in the total international visitor inbound count for China was a more modest six per cent in 2010, however, this translates to an additional 7.3-million additional international arrivals over the 2009 count. "Growth in foreign arrivals to China – that is excluding arrivals from Hong Kong, Macau and Chinese Taipei – was a more robust 19 per cent for the year, reaching a volume of more than 26.1-million arrivals, again, another record," the report said.
The Pacific recorded an increase in foreign arrivals of five per cent for calendar year 2010. Australia and New Zealand, with record arrivals of 5.9-million and 2.5-million respectively, reported full-year growth of five per cent and three per cent respectively for the year. Growth was particularly strong for a number of the smaller Pacific destinations – albeit off a much smaller numeric base – namely Niue (up by 33 per cent), Papua New Guinea (up by 19 per cent) and Palau (up by 19 per cent).
"For the travel and tourism industry in Asia and the Pacific, 2010 has been a very strong year," Kris Lim, director at the Strategic Intelligence Centre of PATA, said, adding that the results for Asia are particularly impressive, with all three sub-regions recording double-digit growth in arrivals, underpinned by the recovery in the key regional source markets of Japan and Korea, the continued expansion of the China and India outbound markets, the continually expanding low-cost carrier (LCC) network in Southeast Asia and a number of global events that took place in Asia such as the Shanghai World Expo in China and the Commonwealth Games in India.
"The economic outlook for 2011 remains broadly positive but growth in GDP and trade worldwide is expected to moderate, following a robust recovery last year," he added. "The USA and Europe remain relatively weak, which means the bulk of the inbound growth for Asia Pacific could be intra-regional going forward."
PATA get new CEO
KATHMANDU: The PATA has appointed William Calderwood to be its interim CEO. Calderwood will take over from the present CEO, Greg Duffell, when the latter’s term of notice is up end February. “We are very pleased that someone of the seniority and experience of Bill Calderwood agreed to step in during this interim period, which gives us more time to hone the search for the most apt candidate to lead the Association forward into the future from its glorious 60-year old past,” said Hiran Cooray, chairman, PATA.
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