Myanmar registers more tourist arrivals

Myanmar registers more tourist arrivals

The first two months of this year saw an rapid increase in the number of tourists to Myanmar. (The Myanmar Times photo)
The first two months of this year saw an rapid increase in the number of tourists to Myanmar. (The Myanmar Times photo)

YANGON - The number of tourists arriving in Myanmar during the first two months of this year increased 22% over the same period of last year, according to the Ministry of Hotels and Tourism.

“We had more than 600,000 international visitors by the end of February, which was more than the same period in 2016,” Myint Htwe, director from the Ministry of Hotels and Tourism told The Myanmar Times.

Overall, there were only 2.9 million tourist arrivals last year, a decline of 38% from the 4.68 million visitors in 2015, according to a new system of collecting data by the ministry which no longer includes day trippers with border passes.

“The previous system counted visitors coming through international border checkpoints. But this year’s figures were systematically categorized into tourists, business travellers, day trippers,”  Ohn Maung, Union Minister for Hotels and Tourism told the recent Asean Tourism Forum in Singapore.  

“The overall tourism outlook is very good, despite the 38% decline due to a different way of counting foreign visitors,” Ma Hnin Hlwar Kyaw Win, sales manager from Myanmar Tourism Services Company said.

Few visitors to Myanmar were coming from Russia or Japan, but tourist numbers from other countries had increased.

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