GGRAsia – Macau June visitor arrivals down 37pct m-o-m as Covid hits

Macau June visitor arrivals down 37pct m-o-m as Covid hits

Jul 20, 2022 Newsdesk Latest News, Macau, Top of the deck

Macau saw an aggregate of approximately 381,000 visitor arrivals in June, representing a 36.6 percent month-on-month decline, said a Tuesday release by the city’s Statistics and Census Service.

The sequential decrease was linked to “tightened cross-boundary measures” between the city and Zhuhai, in Guangdong province, normally the main entry point to Macau for tourists from the Chinese mainland. That was after a series of Covid-19 infections was detected in Macau in mid-June.

Starting from June 19, people travelling inbound to Macau from Zhuhai have needed to present a certificate issued within 48 hours of departure, showing a ‘negative’ result for Covid-19 infection. From that same date, anyone wishing to leave Macau to travel into Zhuhai has required not only a certificate issued within 24 hours of intended departure showing a ‘negative’ result for Covid-19 infection, but has also needed to undergo a seven-day quarantine in a Zhuhai government-designated facility.

Macau had a total of 1,783 confirmed Covid-19 cases as of midnight on Tuesday, in the current local outbreak since June 18. A total of 18 new infections was detected on Tuesday, compared to 10 on Monday, and 22 on Sunday, according to the local health authorities.

Judged year-on-year, Macau’s June visitor tally declined by 28.0 percent, show the data disclosed by the Statistics and Census Service.

For the first half of this year, Macau received fewer than 3.5 million visitors, a decline of 11.8 percent in year-on-year terms. Of those, more than 90 percent came from mainland China, with around 8.6 percent coming from Hong Kong. Prior to the current Covid-19 outbreak, mainland China – historically the main source of gamblers to Macau’s casino industry – was the only place to have a largely-quarantine free travel arrangement with the city.

In 2019, before the onset of the pandemic, visitor arrivals to Macau totalled nearly 20.3 million in the January to June period, representing an average of almost 3.4 million visitors per month, according to the official data.