Singapore tops the list of most visited tourist destination for 2nd consecutive year

Singapore, February 12: Attracting tourist and business market, Singapore tops the record of highesr visitor arrivals and tourism receipts for 2017 for the second time in two years. Arrivals to Singapore increased by 6.2 per cent to 17.4 million, with China, India, Vietnam, Philippines, United States, United Kingdom and Germany hitting record of visitor arrivals.

 

The Singapore Tourism Board (STB) said the top three largest markets for visitors to Singapore were China, Indonesia and India. India saw the highest growth rate, and together with China, contributed to the bulk of the growth in visitor arrivals to the island.

Tourism receipts rose by 3.9 per cent to S$26.8 billion. This was mostly due to visitor arrivals across all top 10 markets growing, as well as more arrivals from high-spending markets such as China, South Korea, the United States and the United Kingdom. China also emerged top in tourism receipts for the third consecutive year.

According to the STB, growth in tourism receipts from China and the UK was attributed to an increase in leisure visitors, as well as a higher spends on shopping. Those from the US also registered a higher spend on shopping, but were mostly in Singapore. Countries that had a decline in spending were Indonesia, India, and Japan.

STB’s chief executive, Mr Lionel Yeo, said that the board was “pleased” to report a second consecutive year of record tourism performance and that it was the combined efforts of STB and its industry partners that “yielded strong results, against a context of better-than-expected global economic recovery, continued growth in Asia-Pacific travel and increased flight and cruise connectivity to Singapore”.