CHINESE hotels suffered a year-on-year decline in occupancy and RevPAR during the first quarter of 2013, as arrivals fell on avian flu fears and a sluggish economy.
According to The HVS Quarterly: Hong Kong, Macau, China and Taiwan Update, China’s international visitor arrivals dropped 0.7 per cent compared to the same period in 2012, with all its top five source markets of Japan, Russia, South Korea, Taiwan and the US registering negative growth rates.
Among the top 10 hotel markets in China – Sanya, Shanghai, Changsha, Xiamen, Beijing, Shenzhen, Fuzhou, Nanjing, Chengdu – all posted year-on-year falls in occupancy.
Average room rates increased across the board, except for in Nanjing and Shanghai.
For RevPAR, only Changhsa, Sanya and Shenzhen were able to boast of year-on-year increases of nine per cent, 0.4 per cent and 0.1 per cent respectively.
Sanya had the highest RevPAR of the major 30 cities in China, but posted the second highest decrease in average occupancy among the top 10, with a year-on-year decline of 8.2 per cent to occupancy of 70.3 per cent.
Meanwhile, Changsha maintained the top occupancy level out of the top 10 at 81.7 per cent, and also registered the highest rate growth of 11.7 per cent to RMB376 (US$61).
Chengdu was the biggest loser in terms of largest RevPAR decline during the first quarter, falling 8.5 per cent to RMB227.
Within Greater China, the report stated that hotel occupancy for all markets dropped, but Taiwan managed to increase its average rate.
Arrivals-wise, Hong Kong saw more than 12.7 million visitors in the first quarter, reflecting 13.5 per cent year-on-year growth over the previous year. The territory’s share of overnight visitors account for 46.9 per cent of arrivals.
In Macau, arrivals rose 1.9 per cent to 7.1 million, of which overnight visitors were 48.1 per cent.
Taiwan saw a surge of 10.7 per cent to 1.9 million international visitors, said the report.
