Indian Travel Is Set for Takeoff
Last year, hotels all over Asia and Australia began hiring Mandarin-speaking staff to better tap the boom in tourists from China. This year, they are adding Hindi television channels and spicy curry to in-room offerings.
The number of Indian tourists heading abroad is expected to jump to six million this year, up 30% from 2003. Outbound Indian tourism will increase at least 15% a year during the next five years as that nation's liberalizing economy expands and incomes rise, according to forecasts by the World Tourism Organization, of Madrid. That growth rate could become much higher still, if the Indian government pushes ahead with plans to loosen restrictions on its aviation industry, where limited capacity long has constrained international travel.
Asian tourism boards and hotel chains are stepping up marketing efforts in India to tap the region's next big travel boom. "In the not-too-distant future, India will be as strong as China," says Patrick Imbardelli, managing director of the Asian-Pacific region for Intercontinental Hotels Group, which owns the Intercontinental, Crowne Plaza and Holiday Inn brands.
China, which dispatched 20 million tourists to the world last year, dwarfs India on the global-travel charts right now. But Indians shop more and stay longer at their overseas destinations. Indian visitors to Singapore, for example, stayed an average of 5? days in 2002, while visitors from China stayed 2? days, according to the Singapore Tourism Board. Indian visitors spent 17% more a day than the average foreign tourist in Singapore that year, and 35% more than visitors from China.
So tourism agencies are thinking up new ways to lure big-spending Indians. The Hong Kong Tourism Board, for example, is creating a "movie map" of the territory that showcases the sites of so-called Bollywood films shot in Hong Kong to lure Indians. The Singapore Tourism Board linked up with Visa International last month to offer a package that includes a free application for multiple-entry tourist visas for the whole family to gold and platinum Visa cardholders in India. Visa customers also will be offered deals on hotels and Singapore Airlines fares. Malaysia's Tourism Promotion Board has launched an aggressive tourist-recruitment campaign with ads on Indian television and in newspapers.
"India is one of the big ones, there's no question of that," says John Koldowski, director of the Pacific Asia Travel Association in Bangkok, Thailand. "We've seen latent potential building for years, but we haven't seen it convert to actual outbound traffic at the same rate as China -- partly because the means, the airline capacity, has not been there. That looks like it's going to change."
Indeed, the number of Indian visitors to Thailand, Singapore and Hong Kong, three of the top destinations for Indian tourists, will increase about 9% a year between 2003 and 2006, according to PATA.
The outflow could increase if the Indian government carries through on plans to further deregulate its airline sector. Seat capacity on international flights in and out of India -- negotiated under bilateral air agreements -- increased 15% between 2000 and 2003, according to the Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation, a Sydney, Australia, consulting company.
A host of airlines, including Thai Airways, China Eastern Airlines and Lufthansa -- have beefed up service, according to the World Tourism Organization. Meanwhile, at least three new budget airlines in Southeast Asia are planning to add flights to India next year.
Last year, a government-commission report recommended that India permit partial foreign ownership of local airlines and allow the country's two private domestic airlines to compete with the state-owned Air India and Indian Airlines on some international routes. The government since has permitted the two private airlines to fly to Nepal, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Discussions on further deregulation have been put on hold while India prepares to stage a parliamentary election beginning next month, but analysts say the commission's report has broad support and is likely to be fully implemented regardless of who wins.
Asian and Australian hotels, meanwhile, have begun catering specifically to the burgeoning Indian market. Intercontinental Hotels' Australian unit has tripled the number of Indian wholesale travel agents it deals with; it also has expanded its own India-based outbound marketing team to 50 from five.
The Hilton Hotel in Singapore, at which Indian guests increased 25% in 2003 from 2002, has added a 24-hour Hindi cable-TV channel to its in-room programming to cater to that growing clientele. "That's phenomenal growth -- especially considering SARS," says Hilton general manager Alain Mahillion, referring to severe acute respiratory syndrome, a deadly disease that struck parts of Asia last year and damped economic activity throughout the region.
Singapore is the top destination for Indian tourists, as well as the best established. The number of Indian visitors to the country roughly doubled between 1995 and 2002, to a total of 375,658, before declining last year amid SARS.
The disease didn't keep C.S. Narayan away. Mr. Narayan, who owns a telecommunications-software company, in December brought his wife and two sons on their first-ever trip outside India. They hit the beach and the zoo, then spent three of four days shopping for a microwave oven and other electronic items that cost twice as much back home.
To cement its position, the Singapore Tourism Board set up an office in Madras last year, its second office in India. The board also established its only marketing-advisory council outside Singapore in India last year. It will tap that body, comprising top Indian tourism executives, for consumer insight to shape coming campaigns.
"India has traditionally been a very strong market for Singapore, and we'd been foolish not to build on such strong linkages," says Chan Tat Hon, assistant chief executive of the tourism board.
Singapore is negotiating a free-trade pact with India, a deal that would boost both business and tourism travel -- and allow Singapore to add more flights to India. "Our existing air-services agreement is maxed out," Mr. Chan says. "It's long overdue for that agreement to be reviewed, and that will all be looked under the FTA."
亚洲旅游业逢迎印度游客潮
去年，亚洲和澳大利亚的酒店开始雇佣会讲中文的职员，以迎接蜂拥而至的中国旅客。今年，这些酒店开通了印度语电视频道并提供辛辣的咖喱饭。
去国外旅游的印度人数量预计今年将达到600万人，较2003年增长30%。据位于马德里的世界旅游组织(World Tourism Organization)预计，随著印度经济自由化进程进一步加快和国民收入的提高，印度出境游今后5年每年将以至少15%的速度增长。如果印度政府推行放松航空业管制的计划，这一速度还将加快，印度有限的航空运输能力长期一直是出境游的一个瓶颈。
亚洲旅游机构和酒店在印度加强了营销攻势，期待从亚洲下一个旅游浪潮中分得一杯羹。Intercontinental Hotels Group的亚太区董事总经理Patrick Imbardelli预计，"在不远的将来，印度市场将象中国一样强劲。"Intercontinental Hotels Group旗下拥有Intercontinental、Crowne Plaza以及假日酒店(Holiday Inn)等品牌。
中国去年共有2,000万人出国旅游，远超过印度。但是印度游客在海外更舍得花钱并且停留时间更长。比如，根据新加坡旅游局提供的数字，2002年去新加坡旅游的印度游客平均停留时间为5天半，而中国游客的平均停留时间为2天半；印度游客每日消费额比外国游客平均消费水平高17%，比中国游客高35%。
因此旅游机构正想方设法吸引出手阔绰的印度游客。比如，香港旅游发展局开发了一条电影景点路线，该路线的景点都曾在印度电影中出现过，以此来吸引印度游客。新加坡旅游局上月与威萨国际(Visa International)联合提供一项服务，印度Visa金卡或白金卡持有者可以为全家免费申请多次往返的旅游签证。持有Visa卡的消费者还将在住店和乘坐新加坡航空航班时享受优惠。马来西亚旅游促进局(Tourism Promotion Board)也在印度电视和报纸上展开广告攻势。
曼谷亚太旅游协会(Pacific Asia Travel Association, PATA)的经理John Koldowski说，"印度是一个旅游客源大国，这是毫无疑问的。过去几年我们看到印度潜在游客不断在增长，但是却没有象中国那样转化为出境游客－－部分原因是出境游的途径，即航空客运能力还达不到相应地水平。现在看来这种情况将会改变。"
实际上，根据PATA提供的数据，前往泰国、新加坡和香港的印度游客数量在2003年至2006年将每年增长9%，上述三地是印度游客的头号旅游目的地。
如果印度政府进一步放开航空业管制，出境人口可能会增多。根据悉尼咨询公司亚太航空中心(Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation)的研究，印度国际航班的运载量（在双边航空协议下协商）在2000年至2003年之间增长了15%。
据世界旅业组织称，泰国航空(Thai Airways)、中国东方航空(China Eastern Airlines)和德国汉莎(Lufthansa)等众多航空公司已经扩大了服务范围。与此同时，东南亚至少有三家低成本航空公司计划明年增开飞往印度的航班。
去年，印度一个政府委员会的报告建议印度允许外国公司持有印度当地航空公司的部分股份，并允许印度两家私营航空公司与国有的Air India和Indian Airlines在部分国际航线上展开竞争。此后，印度政府允许两家私营航空公司开辟飞往尼泊尔、孟加拉国、不丹、马尔代夫、巴基斯坦和斯里兰卡的国际航线。由于印度准备在下月初进行议会选举，进一步放开管制的讨论目前暂时被搁置起来，但分析师称，该政府委员会的报告赢得了广泛的支持，并且不论何方在选举中获胜，该报告都有可能得到全面执行。
与此同时，亚洲和澳大利亚酒店开始专门迎合迅速崛起的印度市场。澳大利亚的Intercontinental酒店将与之来往的印度大型旅社数量扩大了两倍；它还将位于印度的出境游营销团队的规模从5人扩大至50人。
新加坡的希尔顿酒店(Hilton Hotel)2003年印度客人数量较2002年增长了25%，该酒店在房间内新增加了24小时播出的印度有线电视频道以迎合这一增长的客户群。希尔顿酒店总经理Alain Mahillion说，"这是一惊人的增长数字－－特别是考虑到去年SARS的影响。"
新加坡是印度游客首要也是最稳定的旅游目的地。在去年爆发SARS之前，前往新加坡的印度游客数量在1995年至2002年间翻了将近一番，总数达到375,658人。
SARS并没有改变C.S. Narayan的主意。Narayan是一家电信软件公司的老板，他在去年12月份带著妻子和两个儿子展开首次海外之旅。他们游览了海滩和动物园，然后在总共四天的行程中拿出三天购买微波炉和其他电器，这些物品的价格比印度国内便宜一半。
新加坡旅游局为了巩固目前的市场地位，于去年在马德拉斯设立了在印度的第二个办事处。新加坡旅游局还于去年在印度设立其海外首个营销顾问委员会，这个委员会由印度旅游业高层人士组成，新加坡旅游局将利用这个委员会深入了解消费者，以为未来的营销策略提供重要参考。 新加坡旅游局的首席官员助理Chan Tat Hon说，"对新加坡来说，印度一直是一个强劲的市场，我们此前没有与印度建立如此紧密的联系是一件愚蠢的事情。"
新加坡与印度正就自由贸易协定进行谈判，该协定将推动双方的贸易和旅游的发展，并且能够使新加坡开通更多飞往印度的航班。Chan表示，"我们现有的航空服务协议已经发挥了最大效用，这一协议早就应该重新审视了，该协议内容将在自由贸易协定的范围之内。"
