Minister of Tourism Dr. Abdulla Mausoom has said that once the Chinese borders reopen for travel in 2023, Maldives' tourist arrival numbers will increase by 10 percent.
The minister made the remark while speaking at the 1.6 millionth tourist's welcome ceremony. He said that he hopes to see more tourists from China coming to the Maldives next year. Maldives has set a target of 1.8 million tourist arrivals for 2023, which the minister claimed could be easily achieved with the resumption of Chinese arrivals.
He said that some major Chinese airlines have already requested to resume transfers to Maldives by the second quarter of 2023.
Maldives achieved its 2022 visitor target of 1.6 million arrivals 10 days on Wednesday.
“The stakeholders and employees in the tourism industry contributed vastly to achieve this milestone,” Minister Mausoom said.
This year’s 1.6 millionth arrival, Tejas Sanjay Kothari, is an Indian national. The Indian travel market remains the strongest with over 224,000 annual arrivals this year so far. Russia is a close second with over 180,000 annual arrivals while UK is ranked third with over 160,000 annual arrivals.
Before the 2020 pandemic, China was consistently listed among the top five source markets to the Maldives.
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