FLAGSHIP carrier Maldivian is launching new flights to Nanjing, Xi’an and Changsha beginning in February in addition to the current Chinese cities of Chengdu and Wuhan.
The airline did not provide exact start dates for the new services.
A travel consultant in Malé, capital of the Maldives, said more flights from China would provide flexibility to the industry in managing the increase in the number of visitors from there.
“Further flights to different cities provide us with the option of attracting Chinese from other cities,” he said, adding that the Chinese market is growing by more than 20 per cent a year.
China is Maldives’ biggest inbound market, registering 1.1 million visitors for the January to November 2014 or 31.4 per cent of all arrivals in the Maldives for that period.
Maldivian is one of two airlines operating in the Maldives.
The other, the privately owned Mega Maldives, is the largest inbound carrier to the Maldives from China, with three flights a week from Beijing and Shanghai.
