Tourists to Penghu County would not be charged fees when they visit this year, the Penghu Tourism Department said yesterday.
Some Penghu residents have proposed a travel tax or a fee for visitors from Taiwan proper, warning that tourism has exceeded capacity in the past few years.
Department data show that visitor numbers to Penghu in July last year rose by 37 percent from the same month in 2019.
Photo: CNA
While the Penghu County Government last year pledged to study the possibility of a tourist surcharge, the department said that it would not implement such a scheme this year.
Four factors contributed to the surge of visitors in July last year, department deputy director Liu Mei-fan (劉美凡) told reporters on the sidelines of a news conference.
“Taiwan successfully contained the spread of the COVID-19; we postponed the Penghu International Fireworks Festival to that month; and the Ministry of Transportation and Communications offered subsidies for people to travel domestically,” Liu said.
“As people were not allowed to travel overseas freely, they engaged in “revenge travel” — traveling as much as they could in retaliation over the restrictions,” she said, adding that “Penghu is one of the top domestic destinations.”
The fireworks festival runs from Friday to June 28, and airlines and ferries have expanded capacity by about 30 percent compared with 2019, while accommodation capacity has expanded to approximately 20,000 hotel rooms per night, she said.
As the changes would make a huge influx in July less likely, the department halted implementation of the fees this year, she said. “We will monitor the situation to determine a fee policy, as it would affect a lot of people and requires thorough deliberation.”
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