APAC dominates tourism sector

Within the region, figures released as part of the 2019 Mastercard Asia-Pacific Destinations Index showed that the top five most popular destinations remain unchanged – Bangkok, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Tokyo and Seoul. Collectively, last year, this Big Five welcomed more than one-fifth (22%) of all overnight visitors to the region's top 161 cities and regional centres.

Mainland China is seen as continuing to exert the greatest influence over travel patterns and expenditure flows, followed by Japan and Korea. India, however, is rising fast and has an ever-growing significance. Despite this, between 2009 and 2018, overnight arrivals by travellers from the mainland in markets across the Asia-Pacific region surged to 62.4 million from 10.5 million, representing a compound annual growth rate of 21.9%. Unsurprisingly, then, the mainland ranks among the top three source markets for outbound travellers for more than half of the 161 destinations covered by the report.

For the second consecutive year, meanwhile, Japan was the only market in the report to be home to 25% of the region's top 20 destinations, with Okinawa nudging out Kyoto to join the list for the first time – alongside Tokyo, Osaka, Hokkaido and Chiba. Interestingly, Okinawa is now one of the region's destinations with the fastest-growing levels of popularity and has skyrocketed 109 places since 2009. Other fast-climbing destinations include Ludhiana in India, Galle in Sri Lanka and the mainland's Chengdu. Japan's visitor levels, however, are set to hit a new high in the near term with Tokyo hosting both the 2019 Rugby World Cup and the 2020 Olympic Games.

The biggest group of Asian travellers by far is the oft-mentioned Mainland Chinese. Outlining the likely future growth of this particular group, Claudia Verbost, the European Commercial Director of AgencyChina, a Shanghai-headquartered marketing and advertising business, said: “By 2030, 30% of the global travel market will comprise Mainland Chinese travellers. In 2018, the top three expenses of these particular travellers were shopping at 25%, hotels at 19% and dining at 16%. It should come as no surprise that 47% of such travellers consider shopping as an essential part of their vacation, with 84% of Mainland Chinese travellers also buying at airport retail points compared with the global average of just 67%.

"The Mainland Chinese are also travelling for longer – eight to nine days – a one-to-two day increase compared with the previous year. In 2018, 47% also travelled beyond one of the more traditional destinations – Hong Kong, Macao or Taiwan. Indeed, their preferred destinations are changing, with a big rise in the number of trips to the more exotic locations, such as Bulgaria, Cyprus, Fiji, Jerusalem or Morocco. The overall percentage of Mainland Chinese travellers taking guided tours is also dropping and now only represents about a third of the total number. In line with this, the percentage of independent mainland travellers rose to 12.7% for the first four months of 2019.

“After shopping, the next priority of outward-bound mainland tourists is for new experiences, with such bookings up by 110% in 2018, while the number of customised itineraries booked in Europe this year is up 147%. Tour operators also need to bear in mind the needs of the growing female Mainland Chinese market. In 2017, 68% of Mainland Chinese travellers were female and they outspent their male counterparts by 14% when it came to entertainment. In short, to find success with the new generation of Mainland Chinese travellers, you need to ensure your destination is sufficiently exotic, offer unique and customisable experiences, provide localised adventure and cultural tourism and never forget to emphasise how safe it all is.”