International
visitor arrivals into Asia between January and September 2012 showed
a collective increase
of 5.5% year-on-year, according to preliminary results released today
by the Pacific Asia
Travel Association (PATA).
During
the first nine months of the year, the 4.7%collective growth
rate for Northeast Asia
was somewhat lower than the Asia average, however
thispercentage increase
translated to around 7.8 million additional international visitor
arrivals to the sub-region. Intra-regional flows remained the key
force behind this growth in both volume and percentagegain terms
for the period. China (-2%) and Macau SAR (+1%) saw relatively weak
results while the remaining destinations,
Japan (+41%), Chinese Taipei (+24%), Korea (ROK) (+19%) and Hong
KongSAR (+16%), performed strongly with each
destination posting double-digit growth over the period.
Although
South Asia (+7%) recorded a year-on-year increase above the Asia
average, growth was still relatively sluggish compared to the
double-digit growth rates during the corresponding periods of 2010
and 2011. Alldestinations showed slowing growth rates with India
(+6%) and the Maldives (+3%)
registering below the sub-region's average rate. This slowdown can in
part, be attributed to the sluggish arrivals pattern from the main
source market
ofEurope, due to the prolonged economic crisis
there. Even so, source market data for four
reporting destinations within South Asia - excluding India
- still showed that Europe remained the highest traffic-generator for
the sub-region during the first nine months of the year, followed
by Northeast Asia.
Growing
at an average rate of 10% during the three quarters of the year,
seven reporting destinations in Southeast Asia collectively
showed buoyant increases in visitor arrivals from Northeast Asia
with more than 1.3 million additional visitors arriving from that
sub-region. Fast growing intra-ASEAN travel demand also boosted
growth for the period. Nevertheless, most destinations in
the sub-region posted softening growth
rates compared to the corresponding period last year, with the
exception of two significant destinations, Cambodia (+24%) and
Myanmar (+43%).
Martin
J Craigs, PATA CEO, said "Although arrivals growth rates into
Asia have slowed a little, they are still robust. It is particularly
pleasing to see destination Japan recovering its arrivals numbers.
Myanmar, however, has been thestory
of the year."
