Taiwan trying to attract Muslim tourists

Feb 20, 2009, 0:16 GMT

Taipei - Taiwan plans to launch a campaign to attract Muslim tourists to visit the island, with the target of luring 2,000 Muslims annually in the initial years, a newspaper said Friday.

The Tourism Bureau will hold a seminar Friday to introduce the untapped market of Muslim tourists to Taiwan travel agents and to discuss strategies to attract Muslim tourists, the United Daily News said.

'There are millions of Muslims in the world who live in India, Malaysia, the Middle East and Arab countries. The potential is huge,' the News quoted Liu Hsi-lin, an official from the Tourism Bureau, as saying.

According to the News, Taiwan has designed three package-tour routes for Muslim tourists and will upgrade facilities at these tourist spots to meet the needs of Muslim visitors.

Taiwan's population of 23 million is 64 per cent Buddhist, with 60,000 native Muslims as well as 150,000 Muslim workers from Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and the Philippines. The island has six mosques.

Taiwan is also encouraging food companies to produce and export Halal food products to Muslim countries.

Attracting Muslim tourists is in line with Taipei's plan to boost its inbound tourism, which has been hurt by the global recession and by Taiwan's six-decade ban on sea and air links with China, which were dropped in December 2008.

In 2008, Taiwan received 3.84 million foreign visitors, falling short of its goal of 4 million.