Information from the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC) indicated that visitors on package tours totalled 581,000 in January 2016, down by 31.2% year-on-year and 18.5% month-to-month. Package tour visitors from Mainland China (455,000) decreased by 33.2% year-on-year, and those from the Republic of Korea (32,000), Hong Kong (16,000) and Taiwan (33,000) dropped by 18.1%, 29.7% and 29.1% respectively; meanwhile, those from Japan (14,000) increased by 27.1%. Outbound residents using services of travel agencies totalled 118,000 in January 2016, up by 5.3% year-on-year. Residents travelling on package tours rose substantially by 27.5% year-on-year to 52,000; the main destination was Mainland China (78.1% of total), up by 21.3%, followed by the Republic of Korea (7.2%) and Hong Kong (4.3%), both showing year-on-year growth. There were 106 hotels and guesthouses operating at the end of January 2016, an increase of 9 year-on-year. Number of guest rooms totalled 32,000, up by 4,000 (+16.0%) year-on-year, with those of 5-star hotels (20,000) and 4-star hotels (8,000) together accounting for 87.5%. A total of 895,000 guests checked into hotels and guesthouses in January 2016, up by 11.9% year-on-year. Guests from Mainland China increased by 8.3% to 580,000, while those from the Republic of Korea (28,000), Japan (17,000), Hong Kong (108,000) and Taiwan (40,000) recorded double-digit growth. The average length of stay of guests held stable as January 2015, at 1.4 nights. The average occupancy rate of hotels and guesthouses was 76.5%, down by 3.2 percentage points year-on-year; 4-star hotels had the highest occupancy rate at 78.9%, up by 1.2 percentage points. Visitor-guests accounted for 73.7% of the total overnight visitors, up substantially by 5.1 percentage points year-on-year.
