SINGAPORE, Dec 28 — As China loosens infection controls and travel restrictions due to the Covid-19 pandemic, segments of the tourism sector in Singapore are warming up to the prospect of incoming travellers from there. A handful told TODAY though, that they are not feeling entirely buoyant because the ongoing labour shortage means that they are not ready for an influx of tourists just yet.
Charles Tan, managing director of tour agency Pegasus Travel Management, said: “Many of our industry mates left the trade during the pandemic and manpower has become a limiting factor that we have been trying to manage.”
He added that he lost five colleagues who left the industry during the pandemic and that the company has been “aggressively recruiting” to pad up its existing team of 21 employees.
Another tour company here, Oriental Travel & Tours, had similar worries about human resources.
Stanley Foo, its founder and managing director, said: “Singapore is not ready for these tourists from China yet. Many hotels and tourist attractions (and) even the airport is facing a shortage of manpower at the moment.
“If the tourists from China come back to Singapore in big numbers, the tourism industry here will not be able to cope with the sudden increase in the number of tourists.”
Oriental Travel & Tours has enough tour guides ready for the potential influx of Chinese travellers, Foo added, but he felt that other segments such as hotels and attractions should do more preparations with regard to hiring.
The authorities in China are not completely clear on some of the timings and rules that apply to its citizens who travel outside of the country, even though they have announced changes to ease travel into the country.
On Monday (December 26), China's National Health Commission, an executive department of the state council responsible for formulating health policies, announced plans to scrap quarantine measures for overseas passenger arrivals from Jan 8 onwards, ending three years of strict border restrictions for inbound travellers.
Since March 2020, all passengers arriving in China have had to undergo a two-week-long quarantine and the duration was later increased to three weeks.
While other countries all over the world began opening up this year, China held on tight to its zero-Covid strategy to eradicate the coronavirus within its borders.
It was only recently that it started to progressively loosen its quarantine rules. Protests flared up in cities across China at the end of November against unpopular infection controls such as frequent Covid-19 testing.
Its policy now requires incoming travellers to quarantine at a centralised facility for five days followed by three days at home.
In the announcement made on Monday, the authorities said that China’s management of Covid-19 will be downgraded to category B from the current top-level category A. This will take effect from January 8, meaning that the authorities there will no longer be compelled to quarantine patients and their close contacts and lock down regions.
This covers travellers entering China, not Chinese travellers leaving the country.
A translation of the announcement made by the Chinese authorities contained a mention that its citizens’ ability to travel overseas will be “resumed in an orderly manner” but did not elaborate on when this will resume.
Hospitals and medical workers in the country are still scrambling to cope after the sudden U-turn on its strict Covid-19 policies, followed by a nationwide wave of infections.
News agency Reuters reported that online searches in China for popular cross-border trips and destinations jumped after Monday's announcement.
Singapore Airlines Group has been progressively resuming passenger services on its two airlines, SIA and Scoot, to 26 mainland China destinations at higher frequencies. However, prices of flights remain high, with some return flights going for more than S$4,000 (RM17,730).
It said: “China is an important market for the group and we will be ready when the Chinese government further opens up to international air travel.”
It added that it is prepared to capture returning demand and will “continue to take an agile and nimble approach, to be among the first to move as China reopens”.
What other industry players say
In response to TODAY’s queries about China easing Covid-19 regulations, Kwee Wei-Lin, president of the Singapore Hotel Association, said: “(We are) delighted by the news of China’s intention to reopen its borders from January 8, 2023.
“For three consecutive years before the pandemic, China topped the list for Singapore’s international visitor arrivals by country, with Chinese travellers (making up) almost 20 per cent of total arrivals in 2019.”
She added: “While we are excited about the possible return of Chinese guests, the Singapore Hotel Association recognises that important details affecting their outbound travel restrictions remain unclear.”
When contacted, Mandarin Oriental hotel said that the loss of China’s market has had an impact on its booking trend, but “there has been a steady increase of booking enquiries from China since the initial potential reopening of borders in China”.
Christopher Kang, director of commercial strategy for the hotel, said of ongoing manpower constraints: “We are encouraged to see the revival of the travel industry over the past few months and have been stepping up on our recruitment and training programmes.”
Budget carrier JetStar Asia told TODAY: “Before the pandemic, we operated services to five key destinations in greater and mainland China and it remains an important market for Jetstar Asia. As borders reopen, we look forward to restoring our network and responding to demand.”
Before the closure of international borders, Jetstar Asia operated scheduled services to Haikou, Sanya, Shantou and Xuzhou in China and Taipei in Taiwan before suspending all services to mainland China, Hong Kong and Taipei in 2020. ― TODAY
