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BANGKOK, May 3 (APD) -- Bangkok remains the top destination in terms of visitor numbers out of 171 destinations in the Asia-Pacific region, the latest figures from the influential Mastercard Asia-Pacific Destinations Index 2017 showed.
Bangkok has crowned the most international overnight visitor arrivals of the annual Mastercard Global Destinations Cities Index 2016.
It welcomed 19.3 million international overnight arrivals in 2016 of the 339.2 million visits made to the 171 Asia-Pacific destinations on the Mastercard list. This put the Thai capital dethrones Singapore, which attracted 13.1 million.
Thai destinations Phuket and Pattaya also placed in the Top Ten on the report, with 9.1 million and 8.1 million overnight visits, respectively.
Bangkok also topped the list of total nights stayed with 87.6 million nights, showing that visitors to Asia-Pacific destinations are traveling for longer periods. In 2016, visitors to the region stayed for 1,768.7 million nights, compared with 1,023.1 million nights in 2009, representing an 8.1 percent Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR).
In terms of overall tourism expenditure in the region, Bangkok took second place with spending of US244.9 billion spent in 2016. Singapore topped the list with US$15.4 billion.
The growing numbers of tourists from China and South Korea helped to boost these figures to the Asia-Pacific region. Meanwhile, China was the top source market for visitors to Bangkok with affluent Chinese seeking out shopping and dining experiences in the region.
The Mastercard Asia-Pacific Destinations Index 2017, known as an off-shoot of the annual Mastercard Global Destination Cities Index, has ranked tourism destinations in 22 countries.
These include resorts, towns and cities and are ranked in terms of the total number of international overnight arrivals, cross-border spending, and the total number of nights spent at each destination.
The data reflects the increasing importance of the Asia-Pacific region for tourism. In 2016, five of the ten most visited cities in the world were in the Asia-Pacific region.
(ASIA PACIFIC DAILY)
