Travel bubble for safe domestic holidays

 

The government has introduced a green zone domestic travel bubble beginning Nov 20 and the Domestic Travel Bubble Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) were approved on Nov 23.

KUALA LUMPUR: Domestic tourism has been hit hard by the Covid-19 pandemic.

The sector contributes greatly to the economy, recording an expenditure of RM92.6 billion in 2019, according to the Tourism Satellite Account data from the Department of Statistics.

To revitalise and invigorate the sector, Tourism, Arts and Culture Minister Datuk Seri Nancy Shukri recently announced the Domestic Travel Bubble, which will allow people to safely travel between green zones.

The government has introduced a green zone domestic travel bubble beginning Nov 20 and the Domestic Travel Bubble Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) were approved on Nov 23.

The SOP for the initiative, which were prepared by the Tourism, Arts and Culture Ministry (MOTAC) and jointly approved by the Health Ministry and the National Security Council (MKN), can be found on the ministry's website, www.motac.gov.my and on its social media platforms.

This initiative allows movement between green zones, meaning people from green zones can travel to other green zones in the country.

Nancy said this was a strategy under the Tourism Recovery Plan, which covers three strategies; firstly, to restore people's confidence to travel; secondly, to revive and invigorate domestic tourism or "Reviving Domestic Tourism"; and thirdly, to identify all tourism products and increase more creative offerings by maximising resources.

As part of the bubble, the government has come up with incentives and offers for accommodation and transportation, and discounts for local handicrafts.

These include offers on accommodation packages in collaboration with the Malaysian Association of Hotels, which will be offered on the Shopee e-market platform.

"Consumers only need to buy a minimum accommodation package of three day, two night, to redeem a rebate voucher of RM50 and RM100 based on the category of hotel purchased. A total of 43,983 rooms have been targeted for sale through this campaign.

"A total of RM250,000 will be allocated as an incentive for the first 12,500 users who have made a three day, two night accommodation package purchase to enjoy a cash e-voucher of RM20 that can be used to purchase other items in Shopee."

This campaign targets Malaysian citizens and the duration of this campaign is from December to February.

In collaboration with the Malaysian Budget Hotel Association (MyBHA), selected three star hotels registered with the ministry will be allowed to participate in the "Jom Nginap" and "Malaysia Welcomes You" campaigns.

The "Jom Nginap" campaign offers a cashback of RM20 via Touch 'n Go for each minimum transaction of RM50. This offer will run from Dec 31 to March and is limited to the 62,500 bookings.

The "Malaysia Welcomes You" campaign in collaboration with Touch 'n Go will offer a rebate of RM20 for the booking period from April to June 2021, and is limited to 62,500 bookings.

MOTAC secretary general Datuk Dr Noor Zari Hamad said the ministry's incentives also involved local airlines such as Malaysia Airline Berhad (MAS), Air Asia, Firefly and Malindo Air under the Cuti-Cuti Malaysia campaign, which will offer discounts of RM50 each way for economy and business class flights.

The booking period for Malaysia Airlines will run until Dec 3 and the travel period is from November to June 2021.

The booking period for Firefly is until Dec 8 and the travel period is until October 2021. The offer is valid for 9,000 seats.

Air Asia is offering a rebate voucher of RM50 for ticket purchases with a target of 24,000 people. Malindo Air is offering a limited discount of RM50 to 6,000 users with the earliest registration. The campaign for Air Asia starts on Nov 30 and Malindo starts on Dec 9.

All airlines will implement advertising and promotional activities for this campaign, including displaying the "Cuti-Cuti Malaysia" logo in existing advertising mediums as well as on social media accounts, such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.

Initiatives in the services, transportation and private companies segment are in collaboration with Prasarana through the MY30 Pass (Buy 1 free 1) campaign, which is scheduled to start from Dec 7 to March 2021.

This pass is offered to the first 5,000 users where each purchase of the MY30 pass will be given another free pass in the form of a voucher and can be redeemed for the following month. With the MY30 pass, users can enjoy unlimited RapidKL Rail (LRT / MRT / Monorail, Bus and BRT Network rides for 30 days.

A sum of RM500,000 has been allocated for the purchase of craft products at Karyaneka outlets, a subsidiary of Kraftangan Malaysia. Users are eligible to enjoy a discount of RM30.00 for every purchase of a minimum of RM100.00.

This offer starts from Nov 24.Tourism Malaysia has launched a package for civil servants as a tribute to their service during the pandemic.

The campaign is underway in the central region and will be expanded to other regions for the period December to March. To date, 427 packages have been offered for tourist locations nationwide.

Reservations can be made from now on and civil servants can enjoy their package from Dec 1.Up to October, RM115,549 worth of packages were recorded through this Civil Servant Package Campaign.

Nancy reminded those living in the green zones to travel safely according to the SOP set. "Let us prove that we can fight Covid-19 and travel responsibly to redevelop the tourism economy, which has gone through great challenges this year.

"I would like to call on the players of the tourism industry to come up with attractive package offers while maintaining the SOP to ensure the sustainability of the tourism economy, which is one of the major contributors to the economy.

Programmes and initiatives that have been designed are expected to help revitalise the domestic tourism sector with the cooperation of each local tourism player towards the recovery and economic development of the country.

"I also recommend using the services of local travel agents and urge Malaysians to take advantage of the packages offered by local tour operators. I hope travel agents take advantage of this initiative to offer more innovative packages.

"I would like to invite the public to refer to the Tourism Malaysia website at www.malaysia.travel for inspiration on travel trips as well as attractive domestic attractive packages.

-nst online.