TRAVEL agents specialising in North Korea say that business is still good despite harsh new sanctions set to be imposed on Pyongyang by the United Nations.
According to South Korean media, North Korea’s tourism agency has dramatically reduced the price of transportation and accommodation for groups from China, its largest source market.
Cost for a four-day trip to Pyongyang has dropped from 7,000 yuan (US$1,078) to 3,000 yuan, for instance. But even so, few Chinese were crossing the border for vacations.
An agent from China told Chosun Ilbo newspaper that despite the falling prices, the number of Chinese visitors to North Korea is now one-tenth that of the previous year’s figure.
But Sabrina Wong, spokesperson of Explore North Korea, based in the border city of Dandong, said there “is not much difference in prices or the number of Chinese travelling to North Korea”.
“Prices may have fallen in recent years, but I think that has to do with (more competition),” she told TTG Asia e-Daily.
A spokesperson for Dandong Chosun Tour Service, who declined to be named, also claimed that client numbers and prices are “about the same” as last year.
Meanwhile, Simon Cockerell, general manager of Koryo Tours, said none of the Beijing-based companies had been put off by the UN sanctions.
He explained: “Sanctions have no relationship whatsoever to tourism, and the sort of people who want to go to North Korea are not the kind who check UN sanction lists before making a decision on whether to go or not.”
