Local gamblers decrease in Macau
According to a recent government study, gambling participation by Macanese people has decreased over the last 15 years.
Macau.- The Macanese government conducted a study that revealed that gambling participation among the Macanese population has decreased over the last 15 years. The results were recently published by the Gaming Inspection and Coordination Bureau (DICJ), Social Affairs Bureau (IAS) and the University of Macau (UM) and showed that the rate has dived from 67.9% in 2003 to 51.5% in 2016.
The report shows that, since a responsible gambling promotion campaign was launched in 2009, participation in casino gambling dived from 20.7% in 2010 to the 10.4% reported in 2016. Furthermore, it revealed that 157 people have registered with the IAS central registration system of gambling disorder, higher than the 141 and 147 in 2016 and 2015 respectively.
In addition, the document shows that 376 people were banned from entering casinos in 2017, considering both self- or third-party exclusion
Even as locals don’t show much interest in gambling, the economy of the Chinese territory continues to thrive in the gambling industry, mainly thanks to tourism. According to Bloomberg, the territory will knock Qatar off the top of the list of the richest places in the world in 2020, based on figures from the International Monetary Fund.
