More Promotional Activities To Boost Tourism Next Year

KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 13 (Bernama) -- The Tourism and Culture Ministry has planned more promotional activities to boost tourists arrival to Malaysia next year.

Tourism Malaysia deputy director-general Datuk Azizan Noordin said Malaysia would aggressively expand tourism marketing activities around the world to boost the number of tourists visiting the country.

"Last year we had 27.4 million tourists with RM72 billion income made from them, we are really proud of it, but for the first three months of this year we were down at around eight per cent and I think we should be able to get the arrivals up again.

"We are looking at the whole world in total, and for next year we have more than 480 promotional activities throughout the world with 43 overseas officers that will help us with the promotional activities," he told a media conference on 'A Journey Through Time IX' here today.

The seven-day event, which starts on Nov 20 and organised by Starhill Gallery in collaboration with the Ministry of Tourism and Culture, will feature rare timepieces and jewellery collections.

Azizan said Tourism Malaysia would also be collaborating with major airlines around the world.

"We are going to do a lot of promotional activities with airlines like the Etihad Airways, Qatar Airways and Singapore Airlines to bring us more tourists coming in, especially from America, Europe and Middle Eastern countries.

"On the ASEAN market, we are working closely with Air Asia and Malindo Air. We are also looking into Australia and New Zealand and other Oceanian countries," he said.

Meanwhile, Azizan said shopping tourism had always been the number one priority to attract tourists to the country, and the ministry had set up their own shopping secretariat to focus in this area.

"The secretariat will be working with many associations like the Bukit Bintang-KLCC Tourism Association to promote not only prime areas but other shopping areas," he added.
-bernama.