(TAN): International tourist arrivals to Singapore nosedived around 85% in March compared to a year earlier, amid dwindling travel demand created by COVID-19.
According to data from the Singapore Tourism Board (STB) that was published on the Singapore Tourism Analytics Network website, foreign arrivals plunged 84.7% to 239,885 in March 2020 from 1,564,644 in March 2019.
The last time Singapore’s tourism sector had seen a decline of this scale was in 2003, when severe acute respiratory syndrome or SARS had broken out in the island nation, reports said. Singapore had reportedly received 217,000 visitors and 191,000 visitors in April and May 2003, respectively.
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The country received most of its visitors during the month from Indonesia with 46,489 visitors, followed by the United Kingdom with 20,612 and Australia with 18,735 tourists.
China, one of Singapore’s chief source market, accounted for just 1,486 visitors amid travel restrictions caused by the pandemic.
STB’s Executive Director for Digital Transformation, Poh Chi Chuan, reportedly said the drop in March traffic was expected after Singapore imposed several entry restrictions, including a prohibition on short-term visitors starting from March 24
“We expect this downtrend to continue in the light of the global Covid-19 spread,” Chuan, was quoted by The Straits Times as saying.
Foreign tourist arrivals for the January to March 2020 quarter dropped 43.26% to 2,660,192 visitors compared with the same period last year, STB data showed.
Indonesia, with 443,938 tourists, accounted for the highest number of tourists, followed by China with 336,740 visitors. Australia and India followed with 204,127 and 170,432 visitors, respectively.
The South East Asian country has reported 18,205 cases, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.
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