Macau airport flight traffic to reach 30% of pre-pandemic levels in 2022

Ma Iao Hang, chairman of Macau International Airport, predicted that traffic will pick up this year.

Macau.- Ma Iao Hang, chairman of Macau International Airport has said that passenger traffic is likely to rebound to around 30 per cent of pre-pandemic levels this year. In 2019, the year before the Covid-19 pandemic began, Macau Airport handled 9.61 million passengers.

Passenger traffic fell to 1.17 million in 2020 and around 1.15 million in 2021 due to travel restrictions related to Covid-19 countermeasures.

Ma Iao Hang also pointed out that the extension on the south side of the airport terminal will be commissioned this year. Once operational, the expanded airport will be able to handle 10 million passengers a year.

The Statistics and Census Service (DSEC) reported that Macau received 694,430 tourists in January, down 15.4 per cent month-on-month. Macau received 642,016 tourists from mainland China, an increase of 29.4 per cent year-on-year. Mainland China continues to be the only country to have a largely quarantine-free travel bubble with Macau.

Macau visitor arrivals up 30.7% in 2021

Macau received 7.971m tourists in 2021, up 30.7 per cent year-on-year. The average length of stay of visitors increased to 1.6 days during the period. The number of overnight visitors in 2021 was close to 3.7 million, a year-on-year increase of 31 per cent.