Daily Chinese tourist arrivals to break 1,000

Noting that China’s “Oct. 1 National Day Golden Week” holidays will begin Sept. 29 and end Oct. 5, the bureau said in a statement that more Chinese tour groups will travel to Taiwan this weekend at the start of one of China’s biggest annual holiday periods.

As of Wednesday evening, 3,687 Chinese citizens had applied to enter Taiwan between Sept. 26 and Oct. 1 as tourists, according to bureau statistics.

In addition to Sept. 29 — the actual start of Golden Week — the bureau said, the number of Chinese tourist arrivals Sept. 28 is also likely to exceed 1,000.

“As of Wednesday, we had received 972 applications, with more expected to be delivered Thursday. Should this be the case, the number of Sept. 28 arrivals might break the 1,000-mark as well,” said Chang Hsi tsung, a Tourism Bureau section chief.

In line with two landmark agreements signed between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait in mid-June on the opening of direct weekend cross-strait charter flights and wider opening of Taiwan to Chinese visitors, Taiwan has agreed to receive a maximum of 3,000 Chinese tourists per day.

On July 4, the inaugural day of the new open-door measures, 640 Chinese citizens, including officials, journalists and ordinary tourists, arrived via the direct weekend charter flights. However, the daily arrivals have averaged only about 300 over the past few months, far below the expected target.

The numbers remained low until Sept. 19, when 736 Chinese tourists arrived, according to Tourism Bureau statistics.

“Although the number fell short of the target, it did represent an upward trend, “ Chang said, adding that this was supported by the 2,746 who arrived in the Sept. 19-25 period, the 10th week since the launch of the new measures, compared to 1,073 for the ninth week and 908 for the eighth week.

As further negotiations are needed before more direct weekend cross-strait charter flights can be offered, less than half of the Chinese tour groups will be able to arrive via such flights during Golden Week because many Taiwanese businessmen operating in China will return home during the same period and airlines tend to prioritize sales of tickets to individual passengers, as they can fetch higher prices.

“Data available at the moment shows that only 46.5 percent of the 972 Chinese tourists scheduled to arrive Sept. 28 will take direct charter flights, with the remaining groups traveling indirectly via Hong Kong or Macau as in the past,” Chang said, adding that it is the highest ratio for Golden Week.

Chang said major local travel associations will organize delegations to visit China in mid-October to promote specially designed Taiwan tour packages as part of their efforts to attract more Chinese tourists. According to Chang, the Tourist Bureau looks forward to enhancing the daily number of Chinese tourist arrivals to 1,000 in the coming months.

Meanwhile, local tour agents and hoteliers said the government should take further steps to reinvigorate Taiwan’s sluggish tourist industry, including opening the door to Chinese backpackers and intensifying overseas publicity.

According to a report by the World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC) , Taiwan remains an “underdeveloped” country in terms of the contribution of travel and tourism economy to its gross domestic product (GDP).

Among the 176 countries surveyed by the WTTC in 2007, Taiwan ranked 163rd, with the travel and tourism sector contributing only 4.7 percent to its GDP, lagging far behind Macau’s 82.5 percent, Hong Kong’s 15.7 percent, Thailand’s 14.1 percent, Vietnam’s 13.6 percent, Malaysia’s 13.2 percent, China’s 12.2 percent and Japan’s 9.2 percent.

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