MAHB sees increase in passenger growth in June due to Raya holiday

Malaysia Airports Holdings’ (MAHB) network of airports posted a 6.7% year-on-year (yoy) growth to 9.0 million passengers in Malaysia last month due to its Eid Al-Fitr holiday, which coincided with the second week of the school break. MAHB added that this was the second highest traffic it handled for a month, with the highest being December 2018. Meanwhile, international passenger movements for both ASEAN and non-ASEAN destinations grew by 3.4% respectively with 2.3 million and 2.1 million passengers. Beyond the first 10 days of June, there was a 0.3% growth of the after-holiday season of June 2019 against the two-week holiday season of June 2018, which coincided with Eid Al-Fitr. According to MAHB, this was contrary to the past, where a comparison of a non-festive week over a festive week generally registered a decline in growth.Overall, MAHB recorded 12.1 million passenger movements in June 2019, a 7.3% increase yoy. International passenger movements saw a 8.3% yoy growth to 5.6 million passengers while domestic passenger movements grew by 6.5% to 6.5 million passengers.MAHB said that while Malaysia’s June traffic performance is encouraging, challenges and uncertainties continue to remain with respect to airlines performance, competition in the domestic environment as well as the local and global macro-economic outlook. However, it remains positive on the achievement of the targeted growth for 2019 as the immediate future airlines’ seat capacity outlook remains optimistic especially for the domestic sector.Earlier this month, the Department of Statistics Malaysia said domestic tourism expenditure increased by 11.4% last year, with a total of RM92,561 million spent last year compared to RM83,103 million recorded in the previous year. Malaysia also saw a higher record in number of visitor arrivals, with domestic visitors growing by 7.7% to a total of 221.3 million.(Read also: Malaysia Airports concludes branding pitch)Separately, MAHB is also promoting inbound tourism into Langkawi by collaborating with Malaysia Airlines (MAB) for the Discover Langkawi campaign. The campaign is supported by the Langkawi International Tourism Promotional Fund (LITPF) that was launched earlier this year for airlines, travel agents and destination marketing companies to market and attract more international tourists to the beautiful island that is known as the Jewel of Malaysia.The Discover Langkawi campaign is a six-month long contest open to all MAB passengers from all its networks travelling to Langkawi until 31 January 2020. Interested passengers will need to complete the sentence “Tell us why you would like to discover Langkawi” on MAB’s website in less than 30 words. Five winners will be selected each month based on the best captions and will be offered flight tickets to domestic or ASEAN destinations. Three grand prize winners will always win business class tickets to Langkawi.“The double-digit growth at our Langkawi International Airport last year comprised almost 30% of international traffic movement and it was definitely the result of aggressive promotion of Langkawi as an attractive destination. Therefore, we hope to see a further increase in traffic movement with the launch of the Discover Langkawi Campaign,” MAHB’s group CEO Raja Azmi Raja Nazuddin said.Meanwhile, MAB’s group chief revenue officer, Ignatius Ong, said: “It is only fitting that we work together with Malaysia Airports in promoting the country to the world as we are both the first point of contact for any tourist that arrives in Malaysia. Under this partnership, our airline and its frequent flyer programme, Enrich will be working closely with Malaysia Airports on various marketing and promotional activities to attract more visitors to Langkawi.”(Photo courtesy: 123RF)