| In recent years, many of the new rich in China travelled overseas on impulse, mainly for shopping. As prices of luxury goods in foreign countries are much lower than back home, the savings are more than enough to pay for airfares, hotels stay and all other travelling expenses.
Many banks and leasing companies will be saddled with a huge fleet of repossessed buses and vans with exceptionally low market value. They may eventually be sold off as scrap if not offered cheaply toThe China market is just one example. Those handling inbound tours from regions such as Northeast Asia, South Asia, West Asia, Europe, North America, and Australasia are also in the same boat, if not worse, if countries there take a longer time to recover from the pandemic.
Most travel and tour operators depend on inbound and outbound tours for business as domestic tours can only sustain about 10 percent of the existing 5,000 companies. How can this be when the Statistics Department reported that there were 221.3 million domestic visitors making 302.4 million trips and spending over RM92.6 billion in 2018?
Such measures are necessary to keep the company in suspended animation as the rest of the year is a washout for tourism businesses, particularly international travel. If lucky, next year can be breakeven for some if businesses are operated the same way as before. The public sector must also reinvent itself and not remain as ineffective regulators as poor enforcement empowers illegal operators while victimising legitimate businesses. This includes overhauling or replacing the “Travellers Outbound Terms and Conditions” under the Tourism Industry Act 1992.