The Tourism Bureau yesterday faced some tough questions from lawmakers on the legislature’s Transportation Committee, after the bureau said it planned to ask for an increase in its budget for the next fiscal year. The bureau is asking for approximately NT$8.2 billion (US$246 million), compared with this year’s budget of around NT$6.3 billion.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Lee Hung-chun (李鴻鈞) questioned Tourism Bureau Director-General Janice Lai (賴瑟珍) on the effectiveness of its program launched in 2002 to double the number of tourists visiting Taiwan.
Since 2002, the bureau has spent a total of NT$20.8 billion on the program, which has only contributed to a net increase of approximately 3 million overseas tourists. On average, the nation spends almost NT$7,200 on each overseas tourist.
Lee asked if the increase in funding would make a difference this time around, adding that the real issue was the nation’s tourism environment, which has not significantly improved over the years.
“Taiwan should be an ideal place for backpackers,” Lee said. “However, not many tourists want to come because it is difficult for them to get from one scenic spot to another.”
Lee also pointed out that the bureau does not have jurisdiction over all of the nation’s tourist attractions and that this limits what the bureau can achieve.
Kenting (墾丁), for example, is a national park, which is regulated by the Ministry of the Interior, Lee said.
Other lawmakers focused on the issue of Chinese tourists.
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Kuo Wen-chen (郭玟成) said the bureau had yet to fulfill President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) campaign promise to have 3,000 Chinese tourists visit Taiwan daily.
“You bounced that check,” Kuo said. “While nearly all the other government departments are trying to cut spending, you have asked for a NT$1.9 billion increase.”
DPP Legislator Yeh Yi-ching (葉宜津) said that the number of Japanese tourists visiting had dropped 13.93 percent in August and 10.7 percent last month.
While Lai said the decrease had a lot to do with increases to the fuel tax in Japan, Yeh said the government’s coziness with China was the main reason Japanese tourists were not visiting.
KMT legislators Yang Li-huan (楊麗環) and Ting Shou-chung (丁守中) were concerned about the hostility shown toward Chinese tourists, as shown in the incident involving Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait (ARATS) Vice Chairman Zhang Mingqing (張銘清).
In response, Lai said that tourist numbers from South Korea, Southeast Asia, Europe and North America had all grown significantly this year.
Lai said that so far, only seven Chinese delegations had canceled their trips to the Cross-Strait Travel Fair, which is scheduled to begin tomorrow.
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