KUALA LUMPUR (Jan 15): The Malaysian Association of Tour and Travel Agents (MATTA) has called on the government to grant visa-free travel for Chinese and Indian tourists visiting Malaysia.
In a statement today, MATTA president Datuk Tan Kok Liang welcomes the government's move to extend the 15-day visa exemption for tourists from China and India from Jan 1 to Dec 31, 2019, published under the Passports Act 1966 in the Federal Government Gazette.
"According to Tourism Malaysia, Malaysia [saw] 34.2% growth of Chinese tourists and 10.4% growth of Indian tourists from January to September in 2018 compared to the same period in 2017. With the growth of Chinese and India tourists, the government should take the opportunity to entice these two top markets for inbound tourism with convenient and hassle-free entry to Malaysia.
"Neighbouring countries are offering visa facilitation to lure foreign tourists especially to welcome Chinese and Indian tourists. For example, Thailand recently extended the waiver of visa-on-arrival (VOA) fees for visitors from 21 countries, including China and India until April 30, 2019. Arrivals from China and India spiked about 20% compared with the first half of November 2018, when VOA fees were still in effect," he said.
Tan said Indonesia grants visa-free travel to citizens of 169 countries including China and India nationals to the country.
He said the visa-free policy helped boost the number of tourist arrivals by about 20% every year since 2014.
"Malaysia's tourism industry is trailing behind neighbouring countries such as Thailand, Singapore, and the Philippines. The tourist arrivals for ASEAN countries have recorded positive growth in 2017, with 7.8% increase for Thailand, 6.2% for Singapore and 11% for the Philippines.
"Whereas visitor arrivals to Malaysia dropped by 3% with 25.95 million tourists in 2017, compared to 26.76 million in 2016," he said.
Tan said the government should make visa-free travel for Chinese and Indian tourists a national agenda to ensure Malaysia is not losing out in the race for tourists and tourist dollars rather than being overly cautious and 'dilly-dallying'.
Source: http://www.theedgemarkets.com/article/matta-urges-visafree-travel-chinese-indian-tourists