Malaysia most visited country in Southeast Asia under Tiong’s one-year leadership

International Tourists Arrivals in Southeast Asia 2023. Photo credit: Seasia Stats

KUCHING, Dec 12: Malaysia is the most visited country in Southeast Asia region this year with a record of 26 million tourist arrivals from January to November.

In second place was Thailand with 24.6 million tourists for the same period.

Meanwhile, Singapore recorded 11.3 million tourists as of October, followed by Vietnam with 11.2 million (January to November).

Other countries, namely Indonesia, Philippines, Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar recorded less than 10 million tourists each, however, within different time intervals.

This was revealed in a Facebook post on Dec 9 by the ‘Seasia Stats’ page, which had compiled data on tourist arrivals from the official tourism ministry sites of each respective country.

It is worthwhile to note that Malaysia’s current number of tourist arrivals might, if it hasn’t already, pass the 26.1 million foreign visitors recorded in 2019.

This is also by far the country’s highest ever record since the Covid-19 pandemic outbreak in 2020.

Nevertheless, Malaysia’s highest ever record of yearly tourist arrivals was in 2014 with 27.44 million.

Since assuming office since Dec 3, 2022, Minister of Tourism, Arts and Culture Dato Seri Tiong King Sing has led the ministry to surpassing the initial projection of 16 million tourism arrivals in Malaysia for this year.

Under Tiong’s leadership, his ministry’s most recent effort to spur the number of visitor arrivals in the country was the implementation of visa exemptions for arrivals from China and India for 30 days. — DayakDaily