Hotel Revenue Hits All-Time Record As More Tourists Stay Longer

Source : The Straits Times, Nov 26, 2007

THE tourism sector is definitely roaring, as October posted a monthful of records.

First, latest figures from the Singapore Tourism Board (STB) show that hotel room revenue has hit an all-time record of $178.4 million in October - a 37.1 per cent jump over the same month last year.

Average room rates hit $219 a night, a jump of 33.9 per cent - also setting a new record.

Occupancy rates, at the same time, hit 89 per cent, up 1.8 per cent over October 2006.

Yet another record was broken as 911,000 visitors, an increase of 6.2 per cent, came to Singapore last month - a new high for the month of October.

These visitors stayed longer as well, chalking up 3.3 million days, or about 3.6 days per person - a jump of 14.5 per cent.

As for the sources of these visitors, the STB said 54 per cent of them came from 5 countries - Indonesia, China, Australia, India and Malaysia, in that order.

Visitor arrivals from Indonesia, in particular, hit a new record of 215,000 in October, which the STB attributed to the Hari Raya holidays.