Brits choose Malaysia

The UK remains the leading European destination to Malaysia, and the only European market in the top 10 having cumulatively delivered 435,009 visitors between January and December 2009. Tourism Malaysia’s commitment to showcasing its unique diversity, investment in niche markets including, eco tourism, diving, sporting events such as the Formula 1 and stopovers have all helped spur the growth amongst the UK market.Following the successive growth in inbound tourism for the first 11 months of 2009, Malaysia continued its phenomenal success for the month of December, enjoying a 2.3% increase in traffic from the UK market. Overall in 2009, Malaysia registered 23.65 million tourists; this was a significant increase of 7.2% compared to 22.05 million arrivals in 2008, surpassing the target set by the government earlier last year.Minister of Tourism, Malaysia, YB Dato’ Sri Dr. Ng Yen Yen said, “Our figures show that 2009 was a very successful year in terms of our efforts in aggressively promoting Malaysia as one of the preferred holiday destinations in the region. The achievement is much more meaningful to us considering the many challenges and crises that we had to face throughout the year such as the global economic crisis and the H1N1 outbreak.” she said.”I would like to take this opportunity to thank all our partners in the Malaysian travel trade industry and overseas, as well as members of the media, for their support towards this success.” she said.For more statistics, please log on to http://www.tourism.gov.my/corporate/research.asp. - ENDS -