{"id":403026,"date":"2023-12-05T14:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-12-05T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=403026"},"modified":"-0001-11-30T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"-0001-11-29T14:00:00","slug":"Korea-will-remain-NMI-s-largest-tourist-market","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/Korea-will-remain-NMI-s-largest-tourist-market\/","title":{"rendered":"Korea will remain NMI\u2019s largest tourist market"},"content":{"rendered":"

South Korea has been the CNMI\u2019s largest tourism market before the COVID-19 pandemic and the Marianas Visitors Authority expects this to remain true until new, larger markets emerge.<\/p>\n

This was one of the biggest takeaways from last week\u2019s general membership meeting of the MVA, with MVA\u2019s South Korea office representative Seijin Kim sharing that, as of November, Korea made up 82% of the CNMI\u2019s total visitors.<\/p>\n

In a separate interview with MVA managing director Chris Concepcion, he said the Korea market is nearly fully recovered when compared to 2019 numbers and affirmed that Korea has become the CNMI\u2019s largest market post-pandemic.<\/p>\n

Concepcion said the MVA expects Korea to continue to be the CNMI\u2019s leading tourist market well into the foreseeable future.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur projection is that the Korea market will continue to be the No. 1 market in the foreseeable future. It\u2019s a matter of numbers. The outbound travel from Korea is almost fully recovered compared to pre-COVID numbers. Japan is less than half of the number it was pre-COVID. For the next few years, until much larger markets in our region emerge, Korea will be [our largest market],\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

According to Kim\u2019s presentation last week, as of October 2023, 148,081 of the nearly 180,000 visitors who traveled to Saipan were Korean tourists. The remaining 31,000-plus were a mix of other nationalities, including Japan and China.<\/p>\n

Compared to Guam, the CNMI\u2019s tourism industry has already recovered about 76%, Kim said, when compared to 2019 numbers. Guam is at 58%.<\/p>\n

Back in 2019, the CNMI secured about 260,843 flight seats from various markets to Saipan. As of last month, the CNMI had about 198,503.<\/p>\n

In comparison to Guam, Saipan\u2019s tourism industry is recovering at a much faster pace, Kim said. Right now, Guam has secured about 726,084 flight seats in total; in 2023, Guam had about 423,776.<\/p>\n

In terms of the Korean tourism market, the CNMI had 189,155 seats booked to Saipan in 2019; in 2023, about 148,081 seats from Korea to Saipan were secured. This is about a 78% recovery rate.<\/p>\n

Comparatively, Guam saw about 619,396 Korean tourists visit the island in 2019; in 2023, less than half of that was seen, with only 298,992 inbound travelers from Korea. To put that in perspective, Guam\u2019s Korean market has recovered about 48%.<\/p>\n

Kim assured that MVA\u2019s Korea team continues to work hard in marketing the CNMI as a leisure destination.<\/p>\n

Currently, Korea has three flights to Saipan; Jeju Air, T\u2019Way Airlines, and Asiana Airlines.<\/p>\n

Jeju and T\u2019Way currently provide daily flights from Korea to Saipan, while Asiana only provides two flights a week: every Wednesday and Saturday.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The Marianas Visitors Authority hosted its annual general membership meeting last week at the Crowne Plaza Resort Saipan<\/p>\n

-KIMBERLY B. ESMORES
<\/figcaption><\/figure>

<\/p>\n

Marianas Visitors Authority Korea Office representative Seijin Kim.<\/p>\n

-KIMBERLY B. ESMORES
<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

South Korea has been the CNMI\u2019s largest tourism market before the COVID-19 pandemic and the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-403026","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403026","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=403026"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403026\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=403026"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=403026"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=403026"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}