Palau Visitors Authority attends KOTFA 2009 in Korea

This marks PVA’s third consecutive attendance, as it has been proven in the past to be successful in promoting Palau to the growing Korean market. This time, PVA associate Kadoi Ruluked was joined by Ms. Carol Ngiraidis of Dolphins Pacific and Mr. Yuji Beppu from Palau Royal Resort.  The Palau booth was located in the Atlantic Hall of the COEX center, situated right next to Guam Visitors Bureau, Treasure Island Guam and China Pavilion. In the past two years, Palau has been placed in the Oceania Region along with Australia and New Caledonia as there are no other Micronesian islands participating in the show with Palau. During the four day show, PVA staff and the participants gave out promotional brochures and fliers printed in Korean language and employed a Korean college student as translator. Giveaways such PVA beach balls, letter openers, stickers, Palauan coconut candies, not to mention banana chips were a big hit with the crowd that gathers at the Palau booth everyday. A medium number of visitors to the PVA booth knew where Palau is and how to get there; for people who didn’t know where it is, but have heard of it as a “Paradise” showed interest in making it their next vacation destination in spite of the world economic and health crisis. Upon hearing that Palau is a visa free country, flying time between Seoul and Koror takes only 5 hours direct and with news that a Korean businessman has invested 20 million dollars to build a 185 room resort have made them more interested to come to Palau. Last year, Palau received over 14,000 Korean tourists and up to May of this year, we have 6,281 Koreans, thus positioning it as the second largest market to Palau behind Japan. The total visitors for the four days totaled 91,599, a 1.1% increase from last year’s numbers; there were also 2,632 Exhibitors and the show was attended by over 50 countries. The Board and Management of the Palau Visitors Authority would like to take this opportunity and thank HANA Tour-Palau for their generous offers of discounted airfares for the Palau delegation.