LANGKAWI, 14 September 2018: Business appointment sessions at the PATA Travel Mart 2018 in Langkawi got underway Thursday with 252 buyers locked into pre-arrangements appointments with 208 seller organisations.
Pacific Asia Travel Association confirmed the event registered 389 seller delegates with 32% of the turnout coming from host country Malaysia.
All told the sellers represented 33 destinations in the Asia-Pacific, while the 252 buyers came from 241 organisations in 53 tourism source markets.
Overall 1,400 delegates from 70 countries attended the three-day show
The event opened with an inaugural dinner reception on Wednesday hosted by Langkawi at the Mahsuri International Exhibition Centre. The three-day event closes Friday evening, 14 September.
True to form, there was a strong turnout of local travel content suppliers from Langkawi Island and the rest of Malaysia. Malaysia was represented by 67 seller organisations.
The annual Youth Symposium is now a routine fixture in the mart’s programme and positioned as a networking channel to draw younger executives to take a more active role PATA events, while dispelling the association’s “old boys” image of the past.
Malaysia registered 31 million tourists in 2017 and Malaysia Tourism claims tourist arrivals should reach 33.1 million in 2018 and by 2020, when the country celebrates a “Visit Malaysia Year” campaign, arrivals should surpass 36 million.
