International Visitors to Asia Pacific Grew 3% YoY in November 2009

Preliminary figures from PATA show that the numbers of international visitors to the Asia Pacific region grew by 3% year-on-year in November 2009. All the sub-regions, with the exception of the Americas, recorded growth in arrivals for the month. Southeast Asia led the Asia Pacific region’s recovery with a 15% increase in arrivals, boosted by 11% growth to Malaysia and strong rebounds in Singapore (+8%), Thailand (+26%) and Vietnam (+37%).

In northeast Asia, arrivals to China (PRC) fell by two% but Chinese Taipei (+25%), Korea (ROK) (+11%), Hong Kong SAR (+8%), Macau SAR (+3%) and Japan (+2%) all reported growth. Significantly, the 2% growth registered by Japan was the first since July 2008. Overall, growth in international arrivals to northeast Asia averaged 2% for the month.

In south Asia, the Maldives (+7%), Nepal (+8%) and Sri Lanka (+20%) all reported strong growth. But arrivals to India fell by 1%, limiting the sub-region’s overall arrivals growth to just 2% in November.

The Pacific recorded a modest 1% growth for the month on sluggish (but positive) growth in arrivals to Australia (+3%), New Zealand (+0.3%) and Guam (+2%); the US state of Hawaii however, recorded a decline of 1% over the same period.

The Americas also saw an aggregate decline for the month with a 3% drop in arrivals driven in part by an 11% drop in inbound numbers to Canada.

Kris Lim, Director of PATA’s Strategic Intelligence Centre (SIC), said, “We are regaining some of the lost ground as travel demand continues to pick up in the last few months of 2009. The year-to-date rate of decline in international visitor arrivals to the region has now eased to a loss of just three% over the January-to-November period. Based on the latest available results for December 2009 the recovery momentum in arrivals remains strong for many destinations in the region. This is very encouraging and we may look with greater confidence to the year ahead.”

See recent travel news from: Travel News Asia, PATA, November 2009