Tourism In Parts Of Micronesia Continues To Struggle Post Covid

Thursday, 23 January 2025, 4:31 pm
Article: RNZ

Caleb Fotheringham, RNZ Pacific Journalist

The tourism industry in parts of Micronesia has yet to recover from the Covid-19 pandemic.

The Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI), Guam and Palau are either close to half of what the 2019 visitor numbers were, or significantly fewer.

It appears people are leaving for the US for better prospects.

RNZ Pacific's CNMI correspondent Mark Rabago said Las Vegas is becoming "mini Saipan" as people in the CNMI leave in search for better economic prospects.

Asiana Airlines, one of the largest carriers servicing the CNMI, ended its operation in June. Several businesses also shut down last year, including news outlet Saipan Tribune and hotel Hyatt Regency Saipan which had been in operation since the 1970s.

"I've seen a lot of people moving to the US; [from the] Saipan Tribune alone, even before we closed - half the staff is now in Las Vegas which is quietly becoming a boom town," Rabago said, who was the newspaper's editor.

The governor has submitted a proposed revised 2025 budget amid concerns tourist arrivals will plummet.

Local media reports acting Finance Secretary Bernardita Palacios anticipated a "substantial adverse effect" on the CNMI government's revenue collections from a "sharp decline" in tourist arrivals.

It was in contrast with the predictions of former Marianas Visitors Authority managing director Christopher Concepcion who had expected 2025 to have better visitor numbers compared with 2024.

But the CNMI is now expecting to see a withdrawal of more charter services, and Jeju Air has ended its Busan to Saipan route early following a crash in December at Muan International Airport.

"Then this news broke out that DFS, which is a luxury brand mall, is closing down. It's not official, but we've heard from basically the grapevine unnamed employees that they did announce this during the New Year's party that they might be closing this year," Rabago said.

"It's the only mall we have right now that's air conditioned. It's a magnet for tourists, especially Chinese tourists who want to buy luxury items."

According to the Marianas Visitors Authority there were 209,365 visitors in 2024 - not including December - which is slightly more than 2023 which was 195,476 with December also not counted. However, both numbers are far off the 2019 number of 487,008.

Rabago said a lack of tourism diversification had contributed to the poor economic environment.

"It's probably the decision of the government to not tap into the Chinese market, not trying to get more Chinese tourists to come in.

"We just can't live with just Korean tourists... We should have four or three markets."

Japan has also traditionally been a significant market for the CNMI but Rabago said the strong US dollar compared to the Japanese Yen is putting off visitors.

It's a similar story for Guam. In November 2019 there were 143,987 visitors; in November last year there were 54,231 according to the Guam Visitors Bureau.

Total visitor numbers from January to November in 2019 for the same period in 2024 has more than halved, from 1.5 million to now less than 700,000.

Korean visitors, which make up the majority, have gone from 681,844 to 343,335. Japan has had a more dramatic decrease - from 617,008 to 185,219.

Hotel occupancy rates dropped from 90 per cent in January to September in 2019, to 67 per cent last year.

Palau's tourism is also about half of what it was pre-pandemic. In 2019 there were 94,026 visitors; in 2023 there were 41,227 visitors and in 2024 - not including December which is yet to be counted - there were 50,541 visitors.

But in the Cook Islands it's looking better - numbers from its Statistics Office show close to 160,000 visitors went to the Cook Islands between January to November last year, with December figures still to be counted. The record number in 2019 was 171,550.

© Scoop Media

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