TOURISM cooperation between ASEAN and South Korea took a turn for the better in 2011, with the latter implementing measures that paved the way for more ASEAN arrivals.

With South Korea’s visa system seen as a major obstacle to growing ASEAN arrivals, the destination’s authorities cut the number of supporting documents required, introduced double-entry and family-unit visas, relaxed conditions for multiple-entry visas and extended visa validity periods for travellers from Indonesia, Vietnam, the Philippines, Cambodia, Myanmar and Laos from last April.

As a result, 459,300 travellers from these markets visited South Korea between April and November last year, an improvement from the 555,012 arrivals in 2010. Cambodia registered the biggest growth (70.1 per cent), while the Philippines accounted for the lion’s share.

Last year also saw the opening of Korea Tourism Organization (KTO) offices in Hanoi and Jakarta. Another will open in Manila before June.

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IN A significant first, Thailand and Cambodia have announced they will issue a single 30-day tourist visa to non-ASEAN visitors from February 1, with Vietnam and Laos to be brought into the ambit by end-2012.

Aynur San, general manager, Turkey-based Oniva Tours, said: “It will benefit us as we will now pick destinations and products from two or more countries and not worry about itinerary changes due to unforeseen events, say the Bangkok flood.”

Frauke Melchert, Germany-based Meeting Consult International, added: “This is best for bringing more MICE events to ASEAN. Now I can plan multi-country incentives and many combinations of events. I hope more countries will be added.”

Michael Lim, managing director of Cambodia-based Dara Hotels and Resorts, was similarly optimistic about the prospects for MICE, giving an example of how a convention in Thailand could be combined with incentives or post-tours in Cambodia.

He said: “Tourists can now come with different objectives, for instance, wellness tourism for Cambodia and beach tourism for Thailand.”

Jose Henrique Goncalves, managing director, France-based Abako said: “Business travel will also benefit hugely because of the flexibility a multi-country visa offers”.

Echoing their views, Virat Chatturaputpitak, vice president of the Association of Thai Travel Agents and managing director Marwin Tours (Thailand) said immediate benefits could be expected from “cross-border travel with itineraries involving destinations of both countries”.

Cambodia’s minister of tourism, Thong Khon, revealed that the next step would be “to include Laos and Vietnam, develop the road network well and offer our four countries as a package to foreign visitors, a unique concept offering in Asia”.

The vision of a single visa enabling seamless travel across 10 ASEAN countries was one of the recurring topics discussed at ATF this year, with countries pledging to take serious steps in working towards its implementation.

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TOURISM Malaysia will focus its global marketing efforts on promoting events and festivals taking place in the country this year, with a first-of-its-kind Malaysia International Tourism Exchange (MITE) to be a calendar heavyweight.

Tourism Malaysia acting director general Azizan Noordin said: “We will be concentrating on marketing the year’s events under the umbrella brand of Luxury Malaysia.

“Our strategy will involve participating in international travel trade fairs and seminars, public relations and advertising activities, and organising hosted fam trips for foreign travel consultants and media.”

About 40 per cent of its total marketing budget of RM130 million (US$41.5 million) has been set aside to do this.

Under the initiative, Malaysia will promote events such the Kuala Lumpur International Shoe Festival, the Rainforest World Music Festival in Sarawak and the ASEAN Food Heritage Trail. Key highlights of the year are the 61st PATA Conference from April 20-22 and MITE 2012 from May 31-June 3.

To be held at the Malaysia Agro Exposition Park Serdang, MITE 2012 will span five halls: an international hall, a Malaysia hall, an Asian hall, a China hall, a B2C hall and a hall featuring Asian cuisine. Up to 600,000 visitors and 1,500 exhibitors from 25 countries are expected.

Norman Kumar, group deputy CEO of the event orgainser, Myevents International, said: “The concept is a tourism exchange, not a fair. It will bring Malaysia to the world, and the world to Malaysia.”

He added: “It is definitely on a bigger scale compared to ATF or ITB Asia, which focuses on bringing overseas traffic to ASEAN and Asia respectively. MITE has a focus on ASEAN, with Asia as a bigger picture, and the globe as the overall picture.”

In 2012, Malaysia is targeting 24.5 million overseas arrivals and RM58 billion in tourism receipts.

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A NEW initiative to attract inbound traffic from Singapore to Sulawesi is in the making with a plan to sell Manado-Makassar packages riding on a codeshare agreement between SilkAir and Garuda Indonesia.

Visit Indonesia Tourism Officer (VITO) Singapore country manager, Sulaiman Shehdek, said: “SilkAir has four weekly services between Singapore and Manado (North Sulawesi), while Garuda Indonesia has a daily service between Singapore and Makassar (South Sulawesi), and a number of flights between Makassar and Manado.

“As such, travellers from Singapore and other countries can pick any day of the week to visit Manado and Makassar.”

“Both airlines have approached VITO Singapore to link them up with the North Sulawesi Tourism Promotion Board (NSTPB) and South Sulawesi Tourism Board to create two-city leisure traffic.”

Five-day/four-night packages with two nights in Manado and two nights in Makassar are being discussed, which should be ready in time for Singapore’s mid-year school holidays.

Fam trips for Singapore’s travel consultants and the media to North and South Sulawesi from March 3-7 are also being planned.

“Manado has always been known as a diving destination. Now we need the destination to come up with ideas on what they can offer leisure travellers in particular, but also MICE,” said Sulaiman.

NSTB executive director Widijanto said: “We will be responsible for the groundhandling and are working out the details with VITO Singapore.

“The cooperation with VITO Singapore is just the beginning. We are trying to expand our market, and cooperation with VITO is the way to go. The Ministry of Tourism and Creative Economy has VITOs in 11 destinations (worldwide), and we are working with them.”

One example is a partnership with VITO France, said Widijanto. “We are trying to get more of the European market, and VITO France is looking for new destinations (beyond Bali) for special interest tours.”

INDIA and ASEAN member states made history on January 12 by signing a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) that will lead to cooperation on several levels to boost each other’s tourism business.

Areas of cooperation include human resource, technology transfers, infrastructure development, bilateral investments in the tourism and hospitality sector, full liberalisation for airlines to increase flights and mutual marketing campaigns. An office for monitoring its future has been set up by ASEAN in Mumbai.

The MoU’s biggest allure is the potential for air liberalisation. Indian private airlines, thus far constrained by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation from flying many of the available international routes, may now break free from the shackles.

The promotion of Buddhist pilgrimage tours will also be significant in the mutual exchange, and a highlight in the bilateral partnership this year is an ASEAN-India car rally that will run from Batam to New Delhi.

Cooperation will also manifest in areas such as cruise development along the Indian coastline and parts of ASEAN, and tourism flow enhancements.

With 4.5 million Indians travelling to ASEAN in 2010, the growth in bilateral tourism is expected to be exponential. The region is expecting 107 million global arrivals by 2015.

MYANMAR Airways International (MAI) is starting a new daily flight in the Bangkok-Singapore-Bangkok sector from February, deploying Airbus A320 with 150 seats and A321 with 210 seats.

As well, to facilitate travel on their busiest routes, Guangzhou, Siem Reap and Phnom Penh, MAI is offering visas on arrival (VOA) for passengers of any nationality.

Ye Jhan, country manager (Thailand & Cambodia) confirmed that the VOA arrangements had helped to increase business travel to Myanmar.

“We are looking at acquiring more aircraft to support the opening of new routes within ASEAN and to other Asian destinations”, he said.

AIRASIA X’s impending pullout from Europe (London, Paris) and India (Delhi, Mumbai) (TTG Asia e-Daily, January 13, 2012) has drawn a mixed bag of reactions from the travel trade.

Kuala Lumpur-based MP Travel & Tours, whose inbound business mix consists of forty per cent from Indonesia and 60 per cent from India, stands to lose much from the withdrawal.

“Almost all of our customers from India fly AirAsia X, because our partner agency in India has a joint promotion with the carrier for FITs, so this will have a huge effect on our business,” said the company’s assistant manager – outbound, Ice Tey Lan Lan.

“We’ve not yet had a discussion on the issue, but we expect to lose at least 20 per cent of our business in the beginning. We will have no choice but to look for alternative airlines,” she added.

On the other hand, K. M. Lam, manager – international sales, Greater China inbound, of Kuala Lumpur-based Mayflower Acme Tours, said while AirAsia x’s pullout would be a loss for the destinations concerned, the impact on travel consultants would be insignificant.

“Travel consultants will not really be affected by the route cuts, since not many of us use budget airlines in the first place due to practical reasons,” she said. “Budget travellers, FITs and other independent consumers will be the ones affected, since they are the ones flying AirAsia X.”

“As long as the routes are served by alternative airlines, it will be okay for (travel consultants). For example, India has Malaysia Airlines (MAS) and Air India, while Europe has KLM, Lufthansa, Emirates and MAS,” she added.

Chennai-based Travelexpress chairman C. Nagendra Prasad said: “Tiger Airways will still provide the connections from South India to ASEAN. There are also Indigo, Jet Airways and Air India providing air links.”

A FAR-SIGHTED new government in Myanmar has revealed that it is studying the implementation of several tourist-friendly changes in the areas of hotel development, air access and visas.

Policies are in place to develop infrastructure in six regions including Yangon, Bagan, Inle and Mandalay.

U Htay Aung, deputy minister, Ministry of Hotels and Tourism, told the Daily that the country’s land allocation and leasing policies are being relooked, including extending the duration of leases from two to at least five years.

He said: “There are 25 foreign investment-backed hotels here, and we may see a deluge if some of the policy changes take effect. We now charge US$200,000 or a percentage of gross revenue as a fee, whichever is higher. We are working on a formula that will be attractive to new overseas investors.”

According to U Aung Zaw Win, director general, Ministry of Hotels and Tourism, a target to build 24,000 guestrooms in the budget, two- and three-star categories over the next few years has been set.

Illustrating the destination’s dire need for rooms, he said the country’s 739 hotels were all booked out till March.

Aside from infrastructure, the Daily has also learned that a proposal to scrap tax on all incoming flights has been submitted to the government.

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