Tourism | Tourist arrivals slightly up in September

Tourist arrivals totaled 2,427,086 in September, a slight increase of 0.5 percent year-on-year.
According to information from the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC), overnight visitors rose by 11.8 percent year-
on-year to 1,311,533, accounting for 54 percent of the total.
Same-day visitors dropped by 10.2 percent to 1,115,553. The average length of stay of visitors increased by 0.1 day year-on-year to 1.3 days. The average stay of overnight visitors and same-day visitors was 2.2 days and 0.2 days, respectively.
The number of visitors from mainland China rose modestly by 0.3 percent year-on-year to 1,577,481 in September, of which those travelling under the Individual Visit Scheme increased by 4.7 percent to 688,600.
Mainland visitors came mainly from Guangdong Province (668,142), Hunan Province (71,912) and Fujian Province (63,347). Visitors from South Korea (55,075) and Taiwan (91,536) increased by 52 percent and 8.4 percent, respectively. Those from Hong Kong (526,671) decreased by 3.2 percent.
Long-haul visitors from the United States (14,816) and Canada (5,268) increased year-
on-year, while those from Australia (7,968) and the United Kingdom (4,785) decreased.
In the first three quarters of 2016, visitor arrivals totaled 22,868,794, up by 0.1 percent year-on-year; overnight visitors rose by 8.5 percent to 11,407,491 while same-day visitors dropped by 7.2 percent to 11,461,303.
The average length of visitors’ stays increased by 0.2 days year-on-year to 1.2 days. The average length of overnight visitors’ stay rose by 0.2 days to 2.2 days, while that of same-day visitors remained stable at 0.2 day.
The number of visitors from mainland China (15,137,496) and Hong Kong (4,795,478) decreased by 0.5 percent and 2.6 percent, respectively; while those from South Korea (477,454) and Taiwan (809,278) increased by 16.3 percent and 10.1 percent year-
on-year.
Long-haul visitors from the United States, Australia, Canada and the United Kingdom registered year-on-
year growth.