Singapore enjoyed record visitor arrivals and tourism spending last year, according to new findings released by the city-state’s Tourism Board.
Visitation was up nearly 8 percent year on year to 16.4 million in 2016, driven by growth in key markets like China, which contributed 2.86 million visits, an increase of 36 percent over 2015.
Tourism receipts rose by 13 percent to SGD24.6 billion (US$17.7 billion) on strong trends in food and beverage, shopping and hotel spending. The Chinese were the top spenders, shelling out SGD3.5 billion, most of it on shopping, the Tourism Board said.
The board doesn’t break out gaming spend specifically but lumps it in with “sightseeing” and
“entertainment,” which combined accounted for 18 percent of total tourism receipts but was down year on year by 14 percent to SGD4.4 billion.
This is not out of line with results reported by the city’s two casinos, Genting Group’s Resorts World Sentosa and Las Vegas Sands’ Marina Bay Sands. Both saw year-on-year declines in gaming revenue in 2016. Sentosa was down 9.2 percent to SGD1.59 billion. MBS was down 6.5 percent to $2.16 billion.
Looking ahead, the Tourism Board is expecting visitation to top 16 million again this year and tourism spend to grow in the range of 1 to 4 percent to as much as SGD25.8 billion.
Through April, the city has welcomed 5.79 million visitors, an increase of 4.4 percent over the same period last year. Visitation from China, which emerged as the largest feeder market during the period, hit 1.1 million, accounting for nearly 19 percent of the total.
