MGTO lifts tour group moratorium
Macau began welcoming back tour groups on Saturday after the Macau Government Tourism Office (MGTO) requested a moratorium period following Typhoon Hato’s arrival in Macau last month.
According to a statement issued by MGTO, about 410 mainland tour groups were hosted in the city over the weekend. Inspectors of the government bureau were deployed at the various ports of entry to Macau and at major tourist attractions to examine the situation on Saturday, and reported no significant issues.
The Office issued safety guidelines to local travel agencies and hotels last week, calling for their preparation in advance and awareness of safety concerns. The intention behind the safety guidelines, according to MGTO, was to “safeguard Macau’s image as a travel destination.”
After Typhoon Hato struck the territory, MGTO suspended tour groups from August 25 to September 1 in order to “allocate more resources for rescue missions in the catastrophe and restoration works of the city.”
Meanwhile, the latest information from the Statistics and Census Service indicated that around 819,000 package tour visitors traveled to the MSAR in July, up by 21.9 percent month-to-month and 22.8 percent year-on-year. Package tour visitors from mainland China (669,000), South Korea (38,000) and Taiwan (42,000) rose by 25.6 percent, 24.8 percent and 4.8 percent respectively.
In the first seven months of 2017, visitors on package tours totaled almost 4.6 million, up by 12.4 percent year-on-year.
In July, the number of outbound residents using travel services rose by 21 percent year-
on-year to 130,000. Of that number, some 55,000 residents traveled on package tours – 35.8 percent more than in July 2016 – and those departing for mainland China (39,000) rose by 46.6 percent.
In the first seven months or 2017, outbound residents using the services of travel agencies totaled 795,000, up by 12.5 percent year-on-year
The number of guests at hotels and guestrooms in July 2017 amounted to 1,212,000, up by 15.6 percent year-on-
year, and the average length of stay held stable as in July 2016, at 1.4 nights.
The average occupancy rate of hotels and guestroom reached 90.4 percent, up by 2.9 percentage points year-on-year, with that of 4-star hotels rising by 2.2 percentage points to 92.8 percent. DB
