The Macao Government Tourism Office (MGTO) said it expects the number of visitors during the upcoming Golden Week holiday from 1 October to average around 20,000 per day but could could reach up to 25,000 visitors per day.
Speaking ahead of the Chinese National Day holiday running from 1 to 7 October, MGTO Deputy Director Cheng Wai Tong said in an interview that the 26,000 arrivals recorded last Friday was the highest since Macau’s first major COVID-19 outbreak began on 18 June.
“I hope that the number of arrivals during the National Day holiday will increase steadily, with a daily average of around 20,000 visitors, and I am optimistic that it will reach 25,000 visitors,” Cheng said.
He also said a total of 170,000 visitors are expected to enter Macau during the seven-day National Day holiday. However, this would still fall well short of the 665,000 visitors that entered Macau during the same period in 2019.
The MGTO explained that in order to attract mainland visitors to Macau, it has cooperated with mainland e-commerce platforms to offer special deals on hotels and air tickets for the National Day holiday.
Whether that translates into visitors remains to be seen given that China has publicly called for residents to stay home during the holiday season.
Although the Macau government has no plans to introduce quarantine-free entry for foreign visitors, Chief Executive Ho Iat-seng announced last Saturday that mainland China would reinstate both package tours and e-Visas under the Individual Visit Scheme, starting in November.
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