Region’s tourist attractions showcased in Japan

A Macau virtual reality tour was the main attraction of MGTO’s booth at the Japanese expo

Macao Government Tourism Office displayed the city’s attractions at the four-day JATA Tourism EXPO Japan in Tokyo, in a bid to attract more Japanese and other international visitors to the region.
This year, the MGTO booth at the expo featured a heritage-themed decoration and presents as its top attraction a virtual reality (VR) tour through the peninsula.
According to the bureau, visitors to the booth experienced a virtual trip to Macau, with a bird’s eye view of the city’s heritage, the new tourism complexes, a ride on a Grand Prix race and finish with a Bungy Jump from the Macau Tower.
Another feature of MGTO booth was a Macau food truck, set up for the consumer days of the expo on the weekend. The food truck introduced some of the region’s favorite delicacies, prepared by two local food and beverage establishments.
Representatives from Macau’s tourism industry joined the bureau at the expo to promote the city, with the booth also serving as a platform for Macau businesses to connect with their international counterparts and to tap into the Japanese market.
According to the bureau, Japan is one of region’s vital international visitor-source markets. For the first eight months of the year, visitor arrivals increased by 7.5 percent to a total of 187,011 visitors, with overnight stay visitors marking 11.6 percent growth during the same period.
Macau and Japan air links also increased this year, with direct flights to Fukuoka added to the existing daily air links to Tokyo and Osaka.
Meanwhile, MGTO director Maria Helena de Senna Fernandes attended the one-day long forum focused on discussing and sharing best practices concerning the great power of ‘MICE and Sports’ events in contributing to sustainable tourism development ahead of the Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympics.
Under the theme of ‘Green Meetings’ in the MICE session, Senna Fernandes, outlined the latest development of the MICE industry in the city, stating the positioning of MICE industry in Macau as one of the city’s development strategies.
Senna Fernandes also attended the Global Tourism Forum that started with keynote speeches by the Secretary General of World Tourism Organization, Taleb Rifai, and the President and CEO of the World Travel and Tourism Council, David Scowsill. The speeches were followed by a symposium, with the participation of several guest speakers, that focused on how to build tourism destinations through harmonized development.
JATA Tourism EXPO, held from September 22 until Sunday, is Japan’s main international and comprehensive tourism exhibition. Last year the event attracted more than 1,000 exhibiting entities from over 140 countries and regions, and 173,602 visitors.
Further, MGTO also organized a promotion in the country last February, on top of the promotional work carried out all year round. Macau appeared for the first time as a feature destination at the Sapporo Snow Festival, a world famous winter festival in Japan.