The Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S territory in the Pacific, is struggling to revive its main tourism industry to pre-COVID levels three years after the lifting of travel restrictions, amid suspended direct flights from mainland China due to an air travel dispute with the United States. While the number of tourists to Saipan and other islands in the self-governing territory is recovering, largely due to the return of South Korean visitors, its tourism authority reports that the number of visitors in fiscal 2023 was only 46 percent of the level seen in fiscal 2019, before the pandemic.
The situation, far from the level for sustaining the territory, is evident in Saipan, its administrative and commercial centre, where many shops and restaurants in its main tourism district of Garapan have shut down. While arrivals from Japan, once the Northern Marianas’ top market, remain low due to a few direct flights, amid strong competition among travel destinations, the territory is trying to lure Japanese tourists, its officials said. According to local media reports earlier this month, the Hotel Association of the Northern Mariana Islands said the average occupancy rate among 11 member hotels for August was 44.
6 percent, a 16 percent decrease compared to 52.8 in the same period in 2023. The percentage in August this year was half of the 88.
8 percent for the same month in 2019, data from the association showed. “While overall arrivals to the Marianas are higher so far this fiscal yea.