Indian tourist arrivals zip ahead on Malaysia's MICE charts

India's contribution to Malaysia's MICE (meetings, incentives, conventions and exhibitions) arrivals in 2003 touched 18,603 as compared to a paltry 7,351 in 2001, recording a 153 per cent growth.

India, according to the 2003 arrivals, is the eighth largest contributor to the total Malaysian MICE arrivals, ahead of the UK and Germany.

The total Indian tourist arrival in Malaysia in 2003 was 2,00,000 and Tourism Malaysia, the nodal tourism promoting agency of Malaysia, expects this to cross 3,00,000 by 2005.

In 2003, Malaysia attracted 55,0741 foreign delegates (for MICE) or 5.2 per cent of the total tourist arrivals covering 2,294 international conventions. Malaysia, at present, has 1,989 hotels with a total of 1,43,300 rooms.

Speaking at a roadshow to attract MICE tourists from Chennai, Mirza Mohammad Tiyab Beg, deputy director general, Tourism Malaysia, said: "This campaign is a government supported-private driven initiative and is expected to help us acheive our target of 3,00,000 arrivals from India by 2005."

Beg said that until 2001, India was categorised as 'others' in terms of tourists arrival numbers. But the Malaysia-Truly Asia campaign started paying off and since 2002, India has figured in the Top10 countries contributing to tourists arrival in the country.

From the tenth position in 2002, India has moved to the seventh position in terms of overall arrivals. In the same year, India surged ahead of Australia, Tiwan and USA.

Beg said, in the first four months of 2004, arrivals from India totalled 53,219, indicating that the targets set for 2004 is likely to be surpassed. An estimated 52 per cent of tourists visit Malaysia for holiday, 34 per cent for business and 5.7 per cent for conferences.

Nineteen organisations, including the state government, hotels and destination management companies are participating in the roadshow in Chennai.