Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Macau’s number of visitor arrivals fell 93.7 per cent year-on-year to 212,311 last month, the Statistics and Census Bureau (DSEC) announced on Tuesday.
However, the bureau pointed out, the number of visitor arrivals in March rose 35.8 per cent month-on-month, with Hong Kong visitors arriving via the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge (HZMB) up 131.3 per cent. Visitors’ average length of stay rose by 1.8 days year-on-year to three days.
Mainland visitors decreased 96.3 per cent year-on-year to 88,890 last month. Hong Kong visitors dropped 81.5 per cent to 111,347.
Visitor arrivals by land fell 91.9 percent year-on-year to 203,238. Visitor arrivals by air declined 97.1 per cent to 8,950. There were only 123 visitors arriving by sea in March. Macau’s ferry links with Hong Kong and Shenzhen have been suspended since February.
In the first quarter of the year, visitor arrivals dropped 68.9 percent to 3.2 million. Visitor arrivals from the Chinese mainland (2.29 million), Hong Kong (649,868) and Taiwan (80,940) fell 69.2 per cent, 63.8 per cent and 69.1 per cent respectively.
Macau’s economy, its gaming, tourism, retail and media sectors in particular, have been severely affected by the novel coronavirus disease pandemic.
(The Macau Post Daily/Macau News)
