MGTO to launch free tours in overnight visitor push

The Macao Government Tourism Office (MGTO) will provide free half-day tours for overnight visitors as part of an ambitious plan to revive the local tourism sector.
The measure, which is part of a three-stage plan to stimulate the tourism sector once border control measures are lifted on the mainland, was announced earlier this week at the Tourism Development Committee’s first plenary meeting of the year.
Visitor arrivals registered a near-total collapse in the first four months of 2020. In March, the latest month for which full data is available, visitor arrivals were down 93.7% in year-on-year terms, even as there was 35.8% growth from a month earlier.
In response to this unprecedented fall in tourism, the MGTO is working with local hotels, travel agencies, airlines and ferry operators to devise a tourism recovery plan.
In the first stage of the plan, the MGTO will activate a scheme to support overseas promotions carried out by local entities. Then, in the second stage, the MGTO will unveil its own promotional measures, including the provision of free half-day tours for overnight visitors.
In the third stage of the plan, the MGTO will formulate a recovery scheme in accordance with the actual situation in international markets.
Although the MGTO did not disclose the details of this recovery scheme, a government-
issued statement suggested it would include “providing preferential measures for transportation networks such as airline, ferry and border-crossing bus [services].”
The MGTO’s plan is dependent on the resumption of normal border activity with Macau’s largest tourism source market, mainland China. At present, neighboring Guangdong province is enforcing a mandatory 14-day quarantine for all arrivals – even on its own residents.
Members of the Tourism Development Committee used this week’s meeting to express concern about the flow of visitors to Macau should the current pandemic situation extend into next year.
Secretary for Social Affairs and Culture Ao Ieong U presided over the meeting and heard members of the Committee express their opinions on ways to restart local tourism. According to the government, the Secretary thanked the Committee members for their input and encouraged local industry operators to be prepared to welcome visitors again in the future.
The government statement noted that although the local tourism board will be brought under the purview of the Secretariat for Economy and Finance, “tourism is still closely linked with the fields of culture and sports.” Accordingly, the government will continue to attract more visitors through the provision of cultural tours and “mega sports events.”