US-BASED small ship cruise expert AdventureSmith Explorations has engaged two traditional Phinisi ships for its seven-day Sailing Indonesia: Bali, Komodo & Flores Cruise.

Between now and mid-September, the company will launch weekly sailings covering Bali, Komodo and Flores on the 14-pax Katharina and 28-pax Ombak Putih.

Both offer private bathrooms, individually controlled air-conditioning and ample storage space for guests.

Priced from US$2,380, fees include accommodation, all meals aboard the ship, transfers in Flores, non-alcoholic beverages, limited laundry service, guided shore excursions and use of snorkelling gear and sea kayaks/canoes.

Guests can also choose to add on optional activities such as trekking, cultural tours, snorkelling, swimming and nature exploration, while scuba diving is available with advance notice.

CENTARA Hotels & Resorts has signed a management contract for its second east property in the Middle East ­– Centara Muscat Hotel.

Expected to open on June 1, 2015, the hotel is situated in the Oman’s capital of Muscat and owned by Irfan International Hotel Limited.

“We have a strong marketing organisation within the Middle East, along with a very large customer base, and having a hotel in Oman is a strategic advantage for us,” says Chris Bailey, senior vice president for sales and marketing at Centara Hotels & Resorts.

“Our guest mix will be both leisure and business, and the hotel facilities will reflect this.”

Centara Muscat Hotel will offer 154 guestrooms, with two F&B outlets, a swimming pool, a spa and a fitness centre. The hotel will also include extensive meeting facilities.

Centara announced its expansion into the Middle East in February earlier this year, having secured management rights to open Centara Grand West Bay Hotel Doha (TTG Asia e-Daily, February 26, 2014).

FOREIGN travel agencies are alarmed by the abduction of two women from a Sabah resort last week, a mere five months after members of the same militant group killed a Taiwanese man and kidnapped his wife on Pom Pom Island (TTG Asia e-Daily, November 18, 2013).

The incident by the Abu Sayyaf group, which took place at Singamata Reef Resort off Semporna, Sabah, has raised concerns about safety standards in Sabah in general.

Diethelm Travel Malaysia’s managing director, Manfred Kurz, said Diethelm’s European clients have enquired about the situation and now generally avoid selling the east coast of Sabah.

He added: “The capital city, Kota Kinabalu and surrounding areas are still selling well. But demand for the east coast of Sabah reduced a lot after the Pom Pom incident in November 2013. I wouldn’t be surprised if we receive cancellations for bookings (to the east coast) later.”

Adam Kamal, general manager of Rakyat Travel said overseas travel consultants who have made bookings to Sabah for April and May have also asked if Sabah is safe.

Sabah Tourism Board has sought to reassure the travelling public. General manager and board director, Irene Benggon Charuruks, explained in an advisory issued yesterday: “The police have identified the criminals and will continue investigations. The priority is to secure the safe release of the victims. All resorts operators in the East Coast are working closely with the authorities to reinforce and enhance security measures, for the safety of visitors and guests.

“Our attractions including the dive islands-resorts in the east coast, nature and wildlife sanctuaries in Sandakan and throughout the West Coast are open all year-round. Sabah is peaceful and the people are friendly. It is business as usual.”

However, today’s edition of Malaysian daily The Star reported that police have yet to locate the gunmen and their hostages – Gao Huayun from Shanghai and Filipina resort worker Marcy Dayawan.

THE Singapore Tourism Board (STB) is setting aside S$15 million (US$11.9 million) under a new Association Development Fund (ADF) to help associations capture higher value business opportunities, develop capabilities and create unique experiences in their precincts.

Unveiling this during the Tourism Industry Conference 2014 this morning, second minister for trade and industry, S Iswaran, said: “We must focus on concepts and creating distinctive software that can maximise the value we derive from existing tourism hardware and differentiate Singapore from regional competition.”

Highlighting the importance of collaboration among stakeholders, he said: “The rising external competition, the need for innovative ideas and solutions and the growing capability of industry players all mean that our tourism industry is at a stage where interdependence is a key feature.”

According to STB’s assistant chief executive, Yap Chin Siang, this fund is part of the S$905 million Tourism Development Fund that was established in 2005 (TTG Asia e-Daily, March 23, 2012).

Yap said: “One of the key areas for (associations) to address is how to curate more distinctive experiences and to tell their precinct’s stories to visitors…This could be enhanced through training classes or seminars for the association members with the help of the fund.”

STB currently supports the Orchard Road Business Association, Chinatown Business Association and the Little India Shopkeepers and Heritage Association, among others.

While STB already dishes out industry assistance in various grants, Yap pointed that this fund is a first that targets association industry capability.

Howard Lim, chairman of the Society of Tourist Guides Singapore, said such funds will especially benefit non-governmental organisations associations like his. “We are a non-profit group and we rely mostly on volunteers so it is difficult to run everything efficiently from our programmes to bidding for conferences.”

Lim said that due to limited funds, there is only one full-time employee in the 500-member association. With this new grant, when approved by STB, Lim said he may use it to engage a full-time secretariat to support them better.

Applications for the ADF are now open and will close in March 2016.

HIGH prices and low manpower supply remain the bugbears for Singapore’s tourism industry, even as the Singapore Tourism Board (STB) revealed more initiatives to strengthen the city as a quality destination.

At the Tourism Industry Conference this morning, STB’s CEO, Lionel Yeo, said the demand drivers for Singapore were “healthy” (on the back of global interest to travel to Asia and the rise of the Asian middle class). He admitted the city was not a low-cost destination, but visitors would get real value and STB would be working even closer with industry partners to bolster this value.

Among new initiatives: An attractions experience development programme, details in 2Q14, aimed at making Singapore’s tourism attractions experts at providing experiences; a knowledge bank full of best practices on how hotels make do with less manpower, to be available on STB’s corporate website soon; a study looking at improvement opportunities for hotel operations, to be completed by 3Q14; and a hotel industry expert panel set up to chart a hotel manpower roadmap.

There was an “aspiration mismatch” between career-seekers and jobs in the tourism industry, Yeo acknowledged. Less than 30 per cent of jobs in the industry, going by the hotel sector sample, are PMET jobs (Professionals, Managers, Executives and Technicians), yet, more than 60 per cent of job-seekers by 2020 would want PMET jobs, he said.

A manpower study in conjunction with the National Association of Travel Agents Singapore would also be completed by 3Q14, while STB is reviewing the training needs of tour guides, working with relevant organisations to raise the quality of guiding services.

But industry members interviewed by TTG Asia e-Daily said bugbears such as high pricing and manpower shortage would not likely disappear.

Gillian Guy, director Singapore/Malaysia of Destination Asia, said while new attractions and customer-centric promotions would grab clients’ attention, winning them over was another thing.

“The whispers are Singapore is getting even more expensive and no matter how excellent the value is in return, there is at the end of the day a limit to what people would spend. These days, as you know, companies have become careful about their corporate meeting and MICE spend.”

Michael Ma, the entrepreneur behind IndoChine House, said coming up with exciting dining or entertainment concepts to enhance the tourism product was not an issue at all – manpower was, is and will be.

Said Ma: “It’s tough to expand the business. We have a new site at Tanjong Katong. We couldn’t do anything there. We didn’t have enough manpower. We own the building but I’ve never opened it. We don’t even have manpower now to cover (our existing operations) so how could you expand?”

“We’ve been talking about this for a long time. I’ve a restaurant in Germany and the staff there go through three years of training – it’s a profession and the pay is high…Singaporeans really don’t want to do this job, really they don’t. You advertise (heavily) and get 500 applicants. I would say 50 would be from Singaporeans. May be 25 would turn up for the interview and at least 60 per cent want to be managers straightaway.”

– Read the Analysis, What it means to support quality tourism, in TTG Asia soon

SINGAPORE Airlines is upgrading aircraft deployment on selected flights from Singapore to Mumbai and New Delhi.

From May 30, the daily Airbus A380 service to Mumbai and New Delhi will replace the twice-daily flights to each city served by Boeing 777s.

Another daily flight will retain the use of B777s for a total of 14 flights a week each to Mumbai and New Delhi.

Lee Wen Fen, senior vice president marketing planning, Singapore Airlines, said: “We have been keen to operate the Airbus A380 to India and are glad that the Air Services Agreement between Singapore and India now allows us to do so.”

“India is a particularly important market for Singapore Airlines and we are very pleased that more of our customers will soon be able to experience the spaciousness and comfort of the world’s largest aircraft.”

MARRIOTT International launched the 150-room Courtyard by Marriott Tokyo Station last week, the 15^th Marriott hotel to open in Japan.

The hotel is a four-minute walk from the bullet-trained-serviced Yaesu side of Tokyo Station, occupying the first four floors of Kyobashi Trust Tower.

Rooms come in four categories ranging 16-33m². Guests can check-in and check-out via self-service kiosks and use their smartphones to access their room, the first keyless entry service in Japan.

For the ladies, there are women-only rooms that offer enhanced privacy and amenities.

Other facilities on site include a 24-hour gym, free Wi-Fi, café and bakery GG Co that comes with terrace seating, Lavarock restaurant serving bistro fare and grilled specialties, and a library bar on the fourth floor. The hotel’s four separate and fully equipped meeting venues can host gatherings and conferences of up to 130 people.

To mark its opening, Courtyard by Marriott Tokyo Station has launched a My New Stay plan. With a one-night stay going for 26,500 yen (US$257), guests are also entitled to a welcome drink, buffet-style breakfast and a commemorative gift. The rate is inclusive of service charges and applicable taxes, with the exception of a per-person, per-night municipal accommodation tax of 200 yen. The deal is valid until July 2.

WHILE flight capacity between Hong Kong and the US will surge by 22 per cent this year, local travel agencies say that visa processes are still a major stumbling block to growing outbound demand.

Cathay Pacific Airways this year started a new daily service to New York on March 1, and will add a fourth daily direct flight to Los Angeles from June 1 and three more flights weekly to Chicago from August 2.

Delta Air Lines and American Airlines (AA) are scheduled to begin new flights to the city in June, with Delta to launch a daily Hong Kong-Seattle route on June 16  (TTG Asia e-Daily, August 23, 2013) with a 234-seat Airbus 330-200 while AA will inaugurate daily Hong Kong-Dallas flights on June 13, with a Boeing 777-300ER.

According to Morning Star Travel Service’s general manager, Dannia Cheung, US-bound air tickets are always in short supply and growing capacity would alleviate the shortage. “The number of flights to the US never reverted to the pre-9/11 level and we don’t have much group traffic to US as it’s not a hot destination for Hong Kong people and (also because of) the visa issue. However, these new routes may draw FITs.”

Wing On Travel, assistant general manager for South-east Asia & longhaul operations, Simon Ma noted that the US had not only failed to improve its visa processes but also raised visa fees. “Clients have a lot of choice these days and unless the US implements simple online visa applications like Australia does, it won’t drive traffic. Moreover, we haven’t heard from airlines if airfares will be lowered, which may stimulate traffic.”

The US has stepped up its courtship of Hong Kong travellers, opening a marketing representative office as well as rolling out visa-related initiatives and seminars for travel consultants (TTG Asia e-Daily, June 18, 2013) last year.

LAOS is planning to build a cultural tourism site in Borikhamxay province, central Laos within the next two years, but tour operators are less than enthused about the new development.

According to the Vientiane Times, a 13,487m² memorial park for revolutionary leader Sisomphone Lorvanxay will be built at a cost of more than US$2.2 million. The development will include open play areas, a memorial plinth, artificial cave, waterfall, museum, library and an administration building among other facilities.

Speaking to TTG Asia e-Daily, Laurent Granier, general manager of Laos Mood Travel, commented: “Its geographical locations means visitors cross overland to reach the next province of Khammouane and Kong Lor Cave. But this is an expensive option, especially for FITs.

“Central provinces of Laos are tough to sell with European tour operators. They imply long (and rather costly) trips with little choice of international standard accommodation,” he added.

Destination Asia’s group product director, Niels Steeman, said: “I do not believe that this project will boost tourism from the (Western) markets we deal with. The area is little known as a tourism area outside of the backpackers and adventure tourism sector. The infrastructure, including international hotels, just is not there yet.”

However, Natalia Kortchouganova, regional operation director of Asia World Travel, which has offices across Asia, said: “I would question whether a ‘culture park’ would capture the attention of Western tourists. Within Asian travellers though, including Thailand, Vietnam and China, the idea of such a park keeps within their interests.”

AYALA Land and subsidiary Ten Knots Group have broken ground on their Lio resort development in El Nido in Palawan, which has been positioned as an ecologically sustainable tourism destination.

The 100-hectare project is located in Barangay Villa Libertad, El Nido, Palawan, within Bacuit Bay on northern Palawan Province’s west coast, facing the beach on one side and mountains on the other.

In the first phase of development, a township consisting of bed and breakfasts, resorts, shops, and dining establishments will come up on a site of 25 hectares.

Lio will feature hotels, resorts, tourism and commercial establishments, and residential communities blending with El Nido’s natural landscape when completed.

According to Ayala Land president, Antonino T Aquino, Lio is Ayala’s “first venture into tourism estate development and is the first master-planned ecotourism estate in the Philippines”.

He also said that Lio, “unlike other tourism destinations in the country, the entire property is planned, constructed and managed by one developer with sustainability in mind”.

AyalaLand Hotels and Resorts president, Junie Jalandoni, also added: “Lio will further support the thriving tourism industry in the country, and generate employment and livelihood opportunities for the local community. The development will surely boost El Nido’s reputation as a world-class tourist destination.”