According to the data presented by Pacific Asia Travel Association, in January 2011 Asia was visited by up to 7% more travellers. This increase helped to set up new records in many countries of the region.
The flow of tourists in this region increases year after year, making the opening of hotels here more profitable. Current leaders are South Asia and Southeast Asia that keep showing best results in the region during last years. Northeast Asia and the Pacific regions cannot be proud of such rapid growth.
However, this positive trend is under question after the devastating earthquake and tsunami in Japan that have occurred there on March 11. Japan occupies the second place in Asia Pacific with China ranking first. In 2010 the country welcomed 17.5 million of tourists. This was major success after poor 2008 and 2009. Now it’s very likely that the country’s tourism sector will suffer from decline again. Some experts make forecasts about the improving of the situation in the second part of the year. Currently only Sendai airport can be excluded, while airports in Tokyo, Osaka and Fukuoka work in their normal mode as well as the majority of companies in the country.
So what countries had the biggest increase of visitors in January 2011? Among leaders are Sri Lanka (the increase here estimates 46%), Nepal (+ 26%), Myanmar (+ 27%), Vietnam (up 22%), Cambodia (up 18%), Hong Kong (+ 22%), Palau (+ 35%), New Caledonia (+ 16%), and Philippines (+ 17%). Among the countries of the region only Samoa and Vanuatu have shown the decrease in the number of tourists of 2 and 24 percent respectively.