Receipts from travel agencies grew slightly by 0.5% to MOP$6.53 billion in 2016 on the back of a similar increase in the number of agencies operating – up by six to 256 – according to the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC).
Among the various items of receipts, those generated from package tours (MOP$2 billion), room reservations (MOP$1.12 billion) and rental of coaches with a driver (MOP$977 million) rose by 2.5%, 2.0% and 15.6% respectively year-on-year. Receipts from passenger transport ticketing fell 6.2% to MOP$1.78 billion owing largely to the growing popularity of online ticket booking including air, ferry, train and bus tickets.
Gross Value Added by travel agencies – a measurement of the sectoral contribution to the economy – dropped by 1.0% year-on-year to MOP$944 million, while Gross Fixed Capital Formation fell by 11.4% to MOP$142 million.
With a decrease in number of visitors on package tours, as well as fewer outbound residents using services of travel agencies, receipts of the 16 travel agencies with 50 or more persons employed slid by 7.4% year-on-year to MOP$2.24 billion, of which receipts from the rental of coaches with a driver grew 10.3% to MOP$712 million). Those from package tours fell 16.9% to MOP$600 million and room reservations by 8.2% to MOP$390 million.
Conversely, receipts of the 138 travel agencies with less than 10 persons engaged rose by 19.6% year-on-year to MOP$1.5 billion, half of which (MOP$752 million) were generated from passenger transport ticketing, up by 9.1%. Expenditure grew by 19.1% to MOP 1.52 billion, with the purchase of goods and services and commissions paid constituting 88.0%.
As the growth in expenditure slightly outpaced that in receipts, gross surplus of the travel agencies went down by 11.4% year-on-year to MOP 229 million. The Gross Surplus Ratio also dropped by 0.5 percentage points to 3.5%.
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