Golden Week expected to be strong
As Macau marks an exceptionally strong Golden Week, the Macau Government Tourism office has released its tourism master plan, a comprehensive look at the city as a leisure destination in the coming years.
According to the Macau Daily Times, the lengthy document, which took two years to compile, highlights “eight key goals” to be achieved over 15 years.
MGTO Director Maria Helena de Senna Fernandes listed the following goals:
- Diversify tourism products and experiences
- Improve service quality and skills
- Rebrand Macau as multi-day destination and expand high-value markets
- Optimize urban development model
- Manage Macau tourism carrying capacity
- Utilize innovative technology
- Enhance tourism industry cooperation and
- Enhance Macau’s position as a core tourism city regionally and internationally
Senna Fernandes said these “guidelines” will enable Macau to meet its objective, which includes 3 percent to 5 percent growth in visitation between now and 2025, for 38 million to 40 million visitors each year.
MGTO Deputy Director Cheng Wai Tong said the Macau airport and the quality of local tourism products are “two of our main weaknesses where there is room for improvement.” He said lack of developable land in Macau means the city will have to rely on neighboring regions to build “developments of large scale, such as theme parks.” The plan also proposes that new landfills be used to “develop iconic tourism facilities” that reflect a more “family-friendly” approach to tourism in Macau.
He acknowledged public concerns about congestion and inadequate transportation. “Society told us that we need to balance,” he said. The master plan is aligned with the government’s Five-Year Development Plan of the MSAR, especially in terms of the transformation of Macau into a “smart city” with e-booking and e-payment services and digital platforms for promotion and advertising, reported the Daily Times.
Job satisfaction for locals is also high on the list. “In the past, the jobs related to the tourism industry were seen as low in the chain,” Cheng said. “We need to change this and engage more local people in these careers, as well as provide opportunities for the ones already in the business to improve their knowledge and skills.”
Senna Fernandes added, “Besides being a place for leisure and gaming,” Macau should also be a “place for the residents to have quality life, good restaurants, good sports events as well as world heritage sites. All this should be included in the goal of World Center for Tourism and Leisure.”
The Xinhua news agency reports that Macau Chief Executive Chui Sai On said the national development strategy and strengthening of regional cooperation would provide Macau with unprecedented opportunities to accelerate economic diversification.
The Golden Week holiday that just ended could drive the highest gross gaming revenue tally in absolute terms since in three years, reports Grant Govertsen of Union Gaming Asia Securities Ltd.
“For October, we expect GGR to reach approximately MOP24 billion (US$2.98 billion), which would be the highest absolute level of GGR since late 2014,” said a note from Govertsen. “Based on our conversations with junket operators over the past week, as well as similar casino operator commentary, October’s Golden Week holiday is shaping up to be exceptionally strong and we therefore expect strong initial GGR growth indicators over the early days of the month.”
Japanese brokerage Nomura says GGR growth for the month could be even higher, possibly reaching 13.5 percent year-on-year.
“For October, the Golden Week holiday will be the key driver of the month’s performance,” added analysts Vitaly Umansky, Zhen Gong and Cathy Huang of brokerage Sanford C. Bernstein Ltd. “It is too early to gauge how strong October may turn out, but we are preliminarily estimating low double-digit growth.”
Lawrence Ho, chairman and CEO of Melco Resorts & Entertainment, recently told Forbes, “So far this year has surprised us—very pleasantly—in terms of how strong the market has come back” after a 26-month recession that started in mid-2014 and finally started to ease in August 2016.
“Macau went through two very tough years,” Ho said. He said Melco “made use of those two years to focus on efficiency and lean downs, as part of our continuous improvement philosophy.”
Of Golden Week, a national holiday that takes place the first week of October, he said, “I think this Golden Week is going to be phenomenal. So far, year to date, the market is up 19 percent and really across all segments, so the high-end segment, the mass-market segment and the average stay are also increasing.”
