Will European travelers be drawn to the Northern Mariana Islands?
Quite possibly. According to Eurostat, Europeans spend four out of five trips outside their own country.
The Marianas Visitors Authority is hoping so. According to a Nov. 18 release, MVA exhibited at the World Travel Market from Nov. 5 to Nov. 7 in London, where booths cost between £6,000 and £10,000.
The Marianas Visitors Authority toured the Word Travel Market from Nov. 5 to Nov. 7 in London. Photo courtesy MVA.
Aside from meetings with what MVA said were “travel agencies, tour operators, airlines, television programs, key opinion leaders and social media influencers,” – the authority said it also promoted its business-friendly tax structure.
Europeans often travel long-distance since many of them have four weeks or more of annual leave.
However, British travelers are accustomed to package vacations, with four in ten respondents to an Air Travel Organisers Licensing program survey in February saying they would “book a package holiday for their next big trip.”
According to market research firm Euromonitor International, preliminary data for 2023 full-year European outbound volume shows 9.1 million trips made from Eastern Europe to the Asia-Pacific region and 18.7 million trips made from Western Europe to the Asia-Pacific. This represents 65% and 71% of 2019 levels.
Top destinations in the region for Eastern Europeans in 2023 were Thailand, 1.1 million; China, 995,200; Indonesia, 410,900; India, 291,200; and Vietnam, 291,100.
Among Western Europeans, the top 10 destinations were familiar Asia-Pacific tourism hotspots. Thailand took the top position with 3.6 million trips from Western Europe, followed by Pakistan, 2 million, including members of the Pakistani diaspora; India, 1.7 million; Japan,1.3 million; China, 1.1 million; Indonesia, 1.1 million; Singapore, 1 million; Vietnam, 835,100; the Philippines, 662.100; and the Maldives, 655,600.
The UK was the most recovered European source market to the Asia-Pacific in 2023. mbj
South Korea’s budget airlines Air Busan, Jin Air and Air Seoul will merge into single carrier by March 2027. The boards of all three companies approved the merger plan and signed the agreement on Aug 21. The carrier will operate under the Jin Air name.
With the Northern Mariana Islands facing a shrinking private sector, workforce shortages, declining government revenues, and the prospect of hundreds of public-sector furloughs, the three candidates for governor are offering competing plans to rebuild an economy still struggling to regain its footing.
Faʻasao Amerika Samoa and the Conservation Council for Hawaii, represented by the environmental law organization Earthjustice, filed a lawsuit Aug. 18 challenging the Trump administration’s attempt to launch deep-sea mining off the coast of American Samoa.
On Aug. 17 (Aug. 18 CHamoru Standard Time) the U.S. Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management announced the availability of the Proposed Leasing Notice for a proposed Northern Mariana Islands Outer Continental Shelf Mineral Lease Sale later this year.
