Macau recorded 2.86 million visitor arrivals last month, recovering to 83.5 percent of the level in the same month of pre-pandemic 2019, the Statistics and Census Bureau (DSEC) announced yesterday.
Year-on-year, the number of visitor arrivals rose 104.7 percent. However, the number dropped 2.8 percent month-on-month.
Last month's daily average of visitor arrivals amounted to 92,310. Macau's population stood at 681,300 at the end of the third quarter of last year, according to the latest available official demographics.
Same-day visitors (1.48 million) and overnight visitors (1.38 million) grew 154.5 percent and 69.3 percent year-on-year respectively. Meanwhile, visitors' average length of stay dipped by 0.4 day year-on-year to 1.2 days, with that of overnight visitors (2.2 days) and same-day visitors (0.2 day) decreasing by 0.4 day and 0.1 day respectively.
Mainland Chinese visitors rose 107.3 percent year-on-year to 2.05 million in January, with those travelling under the Individual Visit Scheme (1.1 million) increasing 57.8 percent. Visitors from the nine Guangdong cities in the Greater Bay Area (GBA) rose 68.6 percent year on year to 1.02 million.
Visitors from Hong Kong (546,277) and Taiwan (59,921) grew 53.0 percent and 217.6 percent year-on-year respectively. Visitors from the mainland, Hong Kong and Taiwan last month rebounded to 82.1 percent, 102.3 percent and 69.0 percent of the corresponding levels in January 2019.
Macau recorded its first COVID-19 case in January 2020. Pandemic-related travel curbs were gradually lifted by the local government in December 2022.
Foreign visitors totalled 199,278 last month, back to 66.4 percent of the figure in the same month of 2019. Foreigners accounted to 6.9 percent of Macau's total number of visitor arrivals last month.
Visitor arrivals by land rose 96.5 percent year-on-year to 2.26 million last month, while those by ferry (352,564) and by air (243,860) grew 135.6 percent and 156.3 percent year-on-year respectively.
Caption: Tourists queue for a free shuttle bus ride in front of Macau's Grand Lisboa casino-hotel on the peninsula this afternoon. – Photo: Carl Leong
