The country’s commercial capital Mumbai is among the top ten destination cities in the Asia-Pacific region in terms of attracting international visitors, says a MasterCard index.
Bangkok is the top spot in Asia/Pacific’s top 10 destinations in terms of international overnight visitors and cross-border spending, while Mumbai was ranked 9th.
Thailand’s capital Bangkok is followed by Singapore and Kuala Lumpur in the second and third place, respectively. Others in the top 10 include Seoul at 4th place, Hong Kong (5th), Tokyo (6th), Taipei (7th), Shanghai (8th) and Osaka (10th).
Moreover, five Asian cities-Bangkok, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Seoul and Hong Kong – made it to the overall Global Destination Cities’ top ten list which was topped by London.
Asian cities dominate among the leading destinations in the world in attracting international visitors arriving by air, MasterCard Center for Inclusive Growth Chief Economist Yuwa Hedrick-Wong said.
London topped the overall list with 18.24 million international overnight visitors, followed by Bangkok at 18.24 million visitors and Paris at 16.06 million. Others in the list include Dubai (14.26 million visitors), Istanbul (12.56 million), New York (12.27 million), Singapore (11.88 million), Kuala Lumpur (11.12 million), Seoul (10.35 million) and Hong Kong (8.66 million).
In addition, seven of the top ten fastest growing cities by visitor number over the last six years are in Asia. Sri Lanka’s capital city Colombo leads the pack, followed by Chengdu, the provincial capital of China’s Sichuan province and Abu Dhabi at the third place.
This reflects the growing appeal of Asia as it continues to develop, led by the fast emerging ASEAN economies, China and India, MasterCard Southeast Asia President Matthew Driver said.
