Information from the Statistics and Census Service indicated that Macao registered 337,927 visitor arrivals in package tours in June 2008, up by 30.9% from a year earlier. Visitors from Mainland China (222,027) and Southeast Asia (34,775) grew notably by 49.7% and 131.0% year-on-year, while those from Hong Kong (22,579) decreased by 28.2%. In the first half year of 2008, visitors arrived in package tours rose by 23.2% over the same period of 2007 to 2,411,290. The number of Macao residents travelling outbound in package tours in June 2008 decreased slightly by 1.5% year-on-year to 20,179. Mainland China (54.1%), Japan (13.0%) and Thailand (10.5%) were the three most popular tour itineraries. In the first half year of 2008, Macao residents travelling in package tours rose by 8.8% over the same period of 2007 to 106,595. Meanwhile, 32,941 residents travelled outbound under individual arrangements using services provided by travel agencies, up slightly by 1.1% over June 2007. Hong Kong (44.7%), Mainland China (22.1%) and Taiwan, China (10.0%) were the major destinations. In the first half year of 2008, Macao residents travelled under such arrangements rose by 16.1% year-on-year to 182,925. At the end of June 2008, the total number of guest rooms available in the hotel sector grew by 3,013 (+22.8%) from a year earlier to 16,235 rooms. In June 2008, a total of 510,018 guests checked into hotels and similar establishments, representing a year-on-year increase of 25.1%; the majority of the guests came from Mainland China (43.7%) and Hong Kong (25.8%). The average hotel occupancy rate rose by 4.4 percentage points to 73.3%, with 5-star hotels leading at 76.4%; in addition, the average length of stay of hotel guests extended by 0.2 night to 1.4 nights. Total number of hotel guests reached 3,207,588 in the first half year of 2008, up by 19.0% over the same period of 2007. In the first half year of 2008, visitor-guests staying in hotels accounted for 43.2% of the total number of tourists, up from 42.7% in the corresponding period of 2007.
