More Tourists Coming To Sarawak This Year

Sarawak registered a total of 2.7 million tourist arrivals from January to September this year up 16.7 percent compared to the corresponding period last year.

State Tourism Minister Datuk Amar Abang Johari Tun Openg said 1.6 million or 61.5 percent were foreign tourists while the rest were local tourists.

"The top 10 visitor arrivals by countries ranked from Brunei (1,094,866), Peninsular Malaysia (572,727), Sabah (473,108), Indonesia (311,673), the Philippines (55,745), Singapore (30,830), China (26,728), United Kingdom (22,231), India (15,111) and Australia (14,165)," he said when winding-up for his ministry at the State Legislative Assembly, here today.

Abang Johari said the analysis of five selected annual events namely, Kaul Festival, Borneo International Yachting Challenge, Sarawak Regatta, Borneo International Kite Festival and Pesta Benak showed that 35.8 percent of spectators were from outside Sarawak and 76.4 percent were repeat visitors.

"On average, RM189 is spent on accommodation from the average spending of RM543 per person per visit for a two-night stay," he said.

He said based on the feedback received from the Customer Satisfaction Index, most events showed a positive 6.0 rating, indicating that most visitors were happy with the event and wee likely to recommend it to others.

"With the establishment of the standard, we now can identify and categorise those events that have tourism value. It also helps us to identify areas that require improvement or adjustment in order to raise the profile of the event up to international level," he said.

He said to tap the advantages of marketing via the internet, the Sarawak Tourism Board (STB) website www.sarawaktourism.com would be revamped.

He said the new site also complemented the current re-imaging exercise of the 'Sarawak...Where Adventure Lives' campaign.

"It is targeted for translation into two other languages; Bahasa Malaysia and Mandarin. The new site is scheduled to go for soft launching at the end of November. The last phase is slated for completion, come December," he said.

Source - bernama.com.my