Hong Kong and Macau tourism officials have joined forces to market joint tours of the cities to Southeast Asian visitors. The move could particularly appeal to ethnic Chinese visitors from outside Greater China.
One of the challenges in building Macau’s tourism industry is that it has remained predominantly a Greater China market and predominantly a short stay one, focused on gambling trips.
Macau’s new meetings and conventions industry was designed to help combat that problem, but with a regional downturn the marketing team at the Macau Government Tourist Office need all the help they can get.
The multi-destination itineraries could be ready by next month once airlines had set their fares, said Michael Wu, chairman of the Hong Kong Association of Travel Agents.
Mr Wu said Macau enjoyed strong growth in visitors from Southeast Asia last year as more regional low-cost carriers flew to Asia’s casino capital.
In the first 11 months of 2008, Macau recorded 27.6 million visitors and Hong Kong 26.7 million. However, many of the people Macau counts as visitors are day-trippers. In November only 48% of Macau’s visitors spent a night there.
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