Information from the Statistics and Census Service indicated that visitor arrivals in package tours increased by 5.3% year-on-year to 496,726 in November 2009. Visitors from Mainland China (365,788) and Japan (22,338) increased by 9.9% and 23.3% respectively, while those from Taiwan, China (27,867) and Hong Kong (22,389) decreased by 13.6% and 34.4% respectively. In the first eleven months of 2009, visitor arrivals in package tours decreased by 5.4% year-on-year to 4,161,804. In November 2009, the number of Macao residents travelling outbound in package tours increased by 1.2% year-on-year to 20,312, with Mainland China (78.4% of total), Japan (5.3%) and the Republic of Korea (3.7%) being the most popular tour itineraries. In the first eleven months of 2009, residents travelling outbound in package tours decreased by 12.3% year-on-year to 181,090. Meanwhile, outbound residents travelling under own arrangements using services of travel agencies totalled 42,344, up notably by 50.4% year-on-year; the main destinations were Mainland China (35.3% of total), Hong Kong (32.1%), and Taiwan, China (16.3%). In the first eleven months of 2009, outbound residents travelling under such arrangements rose by 21.6% year-on-year to 418,652. At the end of November 2009, total number of available guest rooms at the hotel sector increased by 2,200 (+12.9%) year-on-year to 19,216 rooms. A total of 630,662 guests checked into hotels and guest-houses in November 2009, up by 11.1% year-on-year, with the majority coming from Mainland China (51.9% of total) and Hong Kong (20.4%). The average hotel occupancy rate dropped by 0.8 percentage point year-on-year to 78.4%, with 4-star hotels leading at 88.2%. The average length of stay of hotel guests increased by 0.08 night to 1.5 nights. The cumulative number of hotel guests increased by 1.6% in the first eleven months of 2009 to 6,016,944. In the first eleven months of 2009, visitor-guests of hotels accounted for 61.3% of the total number of tourists, up from 58.0% in the corresponding period of 2008.
