A raft of tourism figures have been published for the first quarter, including the Tourist Price Index, which stands at 146.19, up just 1.5 per cent and the lowest increase in six years. Meanwhile, between January and March passenger traffic at Macau International Airport saw a six per cent increase, while overall visitor arrivals dropped by 3.6 per cent, and hotel guests decreased by 11.5 per cent, during the same period of time.

The increase in the Tourist Price Index in the first quarter has mainly been driven by food and beverage services and the increased price of handbags and souvenirs. The most significant increase was Food (7.86 per cent) followed by Clothing and Footwear (5.4 per cent) and Entertainment and Cultural Activities (5.18 per cent). The room rates of 3 and 4-star hotels in the first quarter were generally low compared to the same quarter in 2014 - leading to a decrease of 4.33 per cent in the Price Index of room rates.

Meanwhile, the daily average airline passenger traffic at Macau International Airport reached 15,000 passengers, with average flights movements of 150 every day. In the first quarter, more than 1.36 million passengers were transported, an increase of 6 per cent; flight transportation exceeded 13,000 movements, to register an increase of 8 per cent. In addition, 258 airports in more than 50 countries and regions participated in the Airport Service Quality Survey. Macau International Airport's overall satisfaction rating was recorded at 4.14 points (from a possible 5 points) for the first quarter of the year. It is the second highest score MIA has ever recorded, ranking it 126 among all airports in the survey.

Overall, the total number of visitors in the first quarter was 7,412,221, a decrease of 3.6 per cent. Of this figure, 4,193,274 visitors were non-residential (total number of 56.6 per cent), an increase of 1.7 per cent. There were some 5,025,943 visitors from the Mainland, 1,505,695 from Hong Kong and 224,808 from Taiwan, decreasing 2.9 per cent, some 4 per cent and 1.5 per cent, respectively. Visitation from South Korea was 168,644 for an increase of 10.8 per cent. The number of long-haul tourists from the United States, Australia, Canada and the UK fell.

With regard to hotel guests, Macau welcomed 2,356,000 in the first quarter, a decrease of 11.5 per cent. The average occupancy rate was 78.9 per cent, a decrease of 7.8 per cent, while guests who stayed in hotels occupy 68.4 per cent of total residential guests, dropping 1.3 per cent.