KUCHING: After only a month, Sarawak's Minister for Tourism, Creative Industry and Performing Arts, Datuk Seri Abdul Karim Hamzah, is already optimistic that his target for four million tourist arrivals this year would be surpassed.
"I'm quite confident of it," he said as statistics showed that the visitor arrival in January had jumped by 10.6 per cent compared to the corresponding month last year.
The Immigration Department statistics showed the visitor arrival to Sarawak last month was 352,983 compared to the 319,064 that came in January last year.
What delighted the minister most is that the foreign visitor arrivals had jumped by 22.63 per cent from the 172,983 that came last January to 212,125 that came last month.
"These are very good indicators. Only in January and we see a sizeable jump in numbers.
"As we have seen in the past, if the indicators in January is like that, the uptrend would continue to the end of the year," he told reporters after launching a homemade movie, 'Raya Mas: Salako Sacred Treasure' today.
Bucking the trend of the past years, domestic arrivals from Sabah and Peninsular Malaysia. have dropped by 3.58 per cent.
The statistics showed that the domestic arrival was 140,858 compared to the 146,081 that came in January last year.
"To me, foreigner arrivals is more important."
"Our overseas promotion is paying off," Karim said, as he praised the promotion team in the Sarawak Tourism Board for their work.
The minister disclosed that next week, he is headed to Berlin to declare open the Sarawak pavilion at the Internationale Tourismusborse Berlin or ITB Berlin- the world's largest travel and tourism exhibition organised by Messe Berlin GmbH.
Last year, the event hosted 90,127 attendees from more than 180 countries.
As expected, the increase in arrivals meant an increase in the tourism receipts which jumped by 12.11 per cent.
Last January, the tourists spent RM809.37 million. Last month, they spent RM907.37 million.
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