Christopher Concepcion
David Apatang
THE Marianas Visitors Authority is looking at Malaysia as a new source market, MVA Managing Director Christopher Concepcion told reporters on Thursday morning.
“MVA is doing a lot — we are always looking for a new source market,” he said. “Historically, our source markets of Japan, Korea and China will always be the main pillars of our tourism industry. But because we have not fully recovered from … Covid levels, we are always looking for new source markets,” he added.
According to Concepcion, “Malaysia is a part of the Guam and CNMI visa waiver program. They can access the CNMI without a visa, so that’s why we’re working with the Guam Visitors Bureau on jointly promoting the Marianas to that market.”
Concepcion believes the Malaysia market will not surpass the established source markets of Japan, Korea, and China.
Still, he added, Malaysia is a potential source market.
Concepcion said MVA is also trying to tap into the Australian market.
“That is another market that does not require a visa. Essentially, they apply for an Electronic System for Travel Authorization or ESTA similar to what the Japanese and Korean passport holders apply for to enter the CNMI,” he said.
“The Australian market is a little bit more challenging — there are no direct flights to our region. Developing that market will take a little bit more resources, time and effort. Right now, because our resources are limited, we are going to concentrate on the source market that we think has the strongest potential,” Concepcion said.
PATA meeting
MVA is hosting the Pacific-Asia Travel Association or PATA Micronesia Chapter Tri-Annual general membership meeting from March 13-15.
The PATA Micronesia Chapter consists of Chuuk, the CNMI, Guam, Kosrae, the Marshall Islands, Palau, Pohnpei and Yap.
On Thursday, each island member representative presented updates, developments, and challenges of the tourism industry in their jurisdictions.
Gov. Arnold I. Palacios, Lt. Gov. David M. Apatang, Senate President Edith Deleon Guerrero and Senate Floor Leader Corina Magofna were among the CNMI officials who attended the PATA meeting.
In an interview, Apatang said, “Like what Governor Palacios said this morning we want to welcome the PATA members to our beautiful islands. I want to say thank you to the members of PATA for visiting us. It’s always good to have this communication and working together as one Micronesia so we can encourage visitors to come and visit our region. It is good to have this organization come here and see where we are as far as the tourism industry is concerned,” Apatang added.
“Tourism is about promotion — we need to encourage more promotion, we need to go out and present ourselves. Guam has … done an excellent job on that, they have a lot of programs. They have more money than us, but we can be smart and do what we can to promote the Commonwealth,” he said.
“I was listening to Guam’s presentation regarding Malaysia. … I am very happy that Guam and MVA went to Malaysia. That’s a lot of awareness. … They shared that Malaysia has an airline, we can work with them and they can visit us here in the Northern Marianas. The most important thing about tourism is to promote our Commonwealth,” the lt. governor reiterated.
For his part, Concepcion said, “The Micronesian region, we are all facing similar challenges, none of us are at pre-Covid levels in terms of visitor arrivals. Guam is down 40% and we are in a similar situation, we are down 40%, so we all are facing the same challenges of trying to bring back up the numbers to pre-Covid levels.”
