Chief Executive Ho Iat Seng said last week that he expects the upcoming resumption of mainlanders’ tour groups and their electronic applications for a travel permit to visit Macau to help bring down the city’s unemployment rate.
Ho made the remarks while speaking to reporters after attending Saturday’s National Day reception at the Services Platform Complex for Commercial and Trade Cooperation between China and Portuguese-speaking Countries (Forum Macao Complex) in Nam Van.
Macau’s latest COVID-19 outbreak that began on June 18 started to subside in late July. The COVID-19 outbreak, also known in Chinese as 618 outbreak, was Macau’s worst since the start of the pandemic in early 2020. The 618 outbreak, which lasted around six weeks, resulted in 1,821 cases.
Since the start of the 618 outbreak, Macau’s unemployment rate has sharply increased, and the increase in local residents’ jobless rate has been even larger than the increase in the general unemployment rate.
The general unemployment rate comprises local residents and non-resident workers.
According to the Statistics and Census Bureau (DSEC), Macau’s general unemployment rate and the unemployment rate of local residents stood at 3.4 percent and 4.4 percent respectively in the March-May survey period. In the survey period of April-June, which began to be affected by the 618 outbreak, the general unemployment rate and local residents’ unemployment rate increased 0.3 and 0.4 percentage points to 3.7 percent and 4.8 percent respectively.
According to DSEC, the survey period of May-July, which was affected by the government’s 12-day “relatively static” restrictions on people’s movements and operations of businesses at around the middle of July, saw a bigger increase in the unemployment rate, during which the general unemployment rate and local residents’ unemployment rate rose 0.4 and 0.6 percentage points to 4.1 percent and 5.4 percent respectively.
Macau’s jobless rate continued to rise in the latest employment survey period of June-August, which was announced on Friday last week, according to which the general unemployment rate and local residents’ unemployment rate increased 0.2 and 0.1 percentage points to 4.3 percent and 5.5 percent respectively.
Ho announced during a special press conference on September 24 that the central government had decided to allow mainlanders’ tour groups to visit Macau again and resume the issuing of e-visas for mainlanders to travel to Macau.
Speaking to reporters on Saturday, Ho underlined that the increasing number of visitors in the run-up to the ongoing week-long National Day Golden Week was helping Macau’s tourism industry gradually recover.
Ho said that with the rising number of visitors, various service sectors, including the restaurant sector, are needing more workers for their operations, calling for civil society to have confidence in Macau’s economic recovery prospects.
The chief executive also said that he expected a good performance in Macau’s tourism sector during the National Day Golden Week, which ends tomorrow, as well as the upcoming resumption of mainlanders’ tour groups and the issuing of their e-visas to Macau, to be able to “strongly support” the city’s recovery in its tourism industry which, he said, could help reduce Macau’s unemployment rate.
Furthermore, Ho also reaffirmed that the resumption of mainlanders’ tour groups and their e-visas to Macau can get off the ground late this month or early next month.
Macau first destination for mainland tour groups
Ho underlined that due to the central government’s dynamic zero-COVID policy and the “volatility” of the COVID-19 epidemic situation in the mainland, the organisation of mainlanders’ tour groups will only be resumed in phases, pointing out that initially tour groups from Guangdong as well as Fujian, Jiangsu, Shanghai and Zhejiang will be allowed by the mainland authorities to travel to Macau, before the measure could be extended to other regions in the mainland in the future.
Ho also noted that the organisation of mainlanders’ tour groups to destinations outside the mainland has been suspended for almost three years, pointing out that the new measure announced by the central government last month means that Macau will be “the first tourist destination outside the mainland” to be visited again by mainlanders’ tour groups.
Ho said that local travel agencies and their counterparts in the mainland are jointly preparing for the upcoming resumption of mainlanders’ tour groups to Macau.
Ho also said that despite the Macau government’s current seven-day hotel quarantine requirement for Hong Kong arrivals, around 100 Hong Kong residents travel to Macau every day on average.
Meanwhile, Secretary for Economy and Finance Lei Wai Nong told reporters after attending Saturday’s National Day reception that the government had helped around 4,800 unemployed local residents find a job during the first three quarters of this year.
4 land auctions
Meanwhile, Ho also told reporters on Saturday that the Macau government will hold land auctions in the near future for four plots earmarked for residential projects, adding that the government has completed land surveys of the four plots and its preparatory work for the upcoming auctions.
The chief executive also said that he expected the government-appointed Urban Planning Council (CPU) to announce details of the land auctions for the four plots later this month. He also said that residential flats on the four plots would only be available on the property market three or four years after their respective land concessions have been granted to developers.
Since the establishment of the Macau Special Administrative Region (MSAR) in December 1999, only three plots of land have been awarded to the private sector through land auctions, according to previous news reports. Most plots were directly granted to enterprises and organisations over the past two decades, such as for casino-hotel operators.
According to the Land Law, which took effect in 2014, all new land concessions must be awarded via open tender except when public interest is involved.
Chief Executive Ho Iat Seng speaks to reporters at the Forum Macao Complex on Saturday after addressing the local government’s National Day reception. – Photo: GCS
