IN A bid to increase leisure travel arrivals from India, Taiwan Tourism Bureau (TTB) will kick off a three-city roadshow in the country later this month, with an online training programme for the trade on the cards.
Starting in Kolkata in end-October, the bureau will move to New Delhi in January and Mumbai in March as part of its new advertising push. It will promote products such as Taroko Gorge, National Palace Museum as well as the Lantern Festival and Mazu Culture Festival.
Noel Saxena, country head of the TTB representative office in India, said: “Through the series of roadshows we aim to educate travel consultants about our various offerings.”
He said that India sent 15.7 per cent more leisure travellers to Taiwan last year compared to the year before. According to TTB, around 29,000 Indian nationals visited Taiwan in 2012.
“This year we will engage in a lot of B2C activities like outdoor advertising and aggressive promotion in mainstream newspapers to educate the potential Indian traveller,” said Saxena.
The NTO is also mulling an online training programme for Indian travel consultants by end-2014.
Chung-Kwang Tien, representative of the Taipei Economic and Cultural Centre in India, commented: “India is an emerging market for us. Earlier, we were concentrating a lot on markets like the US, Japan, South Korea and South-east Asian countries. But now these markets have reached saturation. India, which has a strong outbound market, offers a lot of potential for us.”
TTB is also looking to tap the Indian MICE segment, promoting Taipei, Kaohsiung and Taichung as MICE destinations. Taiwan attracted 10 to 12 MICE groups from India in 2012.
Said Saxena: “We have noticed a steady increase in MICE traffic from India to Taiwan. This year, we are expecting at least 10 per cent growth in MICE arrivals. We want to educate MICE organisers about our various incentive plans. We are also planning fam trips for MICE organisers in the near future.”
