It was another record breaking year as Malaysia registered 17.54 million visitors (17,546,863) in 2006, slightly surpassing the target of 17.5 million. This is an overall increase of 6.8% compared to the previous year.

MONTH	TOURIST ARRIVALS 2005	TOURIST ARRIVALS 2006	CHANGE %
DEC	1,417,236	1,539,329	8.6

Source: Immigration Department of Malaysia

The month of December alone registered an overwhelming increase of 8.6% in tourist arrivals with 1,539,329 visitors in 2006 against 1,417,236 visitors for the same period last year. The figure for December shows the positive trend of tourist arrivals into Malaysia for 2006 exceeding the 1.3 million mark.

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MONTH	TOURIST ARRIVALS 2005	TOURIST ARRIVALS 2006	CHANGE %
DEC	1,417,236	1,539,329	8.6

Source: Immigration Department of Malaysia

The total tourist receipts for 2006 was RM36.2 billion, an increase of about 13% compared to 2005. This is, however, RM1.4 billion less than the targeted figure of RM37.6 billion.

Asia contributed 89.4% of the total tourist arrivals. ASEAN remains the most lucrative market with Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia and Brunei supplying 77.22% of the total figure. There was also a significant increase in the number of visitors from China (24.8%), South Korea (19.8%) and Hong Kong (15.5%).

The top 10 markets in 2006 were Singapore (9,656,251 visitors), Thailand (1,891,921 visitors), Indonesia (1,217,024 visitors), Brunei (784,446 visitors), China (439,294 visitors), Japan (354,213), India (279,046 visitors), Australia (277,125 visitors), United Kingdom (252,035 visitors) and the Philippines (211,123 visitors).

Markets with double digit growth Overall, most markets showed double digit growth compared to the previous year. The highest growth was recorded from Brunei (61.3%) followed by Russia (54.4%), Indonesia (26.4%), China (24.8%), India (23.6%), South Africa (23.2%), West Asia (22.2%), France (22.0%), Italy (21.7%) and Vietnam (21.5%).