00:00To make sure, so I send our team to go there.
00:03Tourism Malaysia Director General Mohamed Amiral Rizal Abdul Rahim told The Star in a recent interview that they are rebalancing
00:11their strategy for international visitors.
00:13He said they are putting greater emphasis on Asia-Pacific markets while maintaining its presence in long haul and Middle
00:20Eastern countries as regional conflicts continue to disrupt global travel.
00:25I think what happened in Middle East is shock the world and of course tourism is very fragile and easy
00:34to be affected.
00:36Then immediately we have a crisis management team to do different focus and especially in terms of marketing.
00:44We put more efforts in ASEAN, China, India, Japan, South Korea.
00:51But we don't forget this Middle East, but only for exposure and something not really tactical.
00:58Because why we still need numbers, we lost a lot of numbers coming from Middle East and through Middle East.
01:07Especially the destination that always use Middle East to connect to Malaysia.
01:14The country that we have direct flight which is not affected with the Middle East connectivity, yes, we still focus
01:19on it.
01:20We really strategize our marketing to go deep into this market to make sure that we can find the higher
01:27people to come to Malaysia.
01:28Besides the main city, we also go to the secondary city.
01:33For example in Thailand, like Chiang Mai, Chiang Rai, create more demand there using Thai local carriers to make sure
01:42that they can connect all these cities to come to Malaysia.
01:47Malaysia is targeting 47 million tourist arrivals under the Visit Malaysia 2026 campaign, which has now been extended into 2027
01:57with a stronger focus on resilience and market diversification.
02:01Mohamed Amirul Rizal said there will be more exciting events lined up to ramp up the numbers, including Festival Budaya
02:08Malaysia, Chitrawarna Malaysia, the Rainforest World Music Festival, and Malaysia Mega Sail Carnival.
02:14And he said Tourism Malaysia will also do more to open up markets and make Malaysian tourism products known to
02:20more people.
02:21We have a big event coming soon, like Festival Budaya Malaysia, which we introduce all the cultural in our country.
02:30The cultural is not about dancing alone, it's also about food, traditional craft making and other at one place.
02:37So we will start in Ipok, end of June.
02:40Then we're coming up another cultural event, like Chitrawarna, big one, a parade of cultural, involving all the states in
02:48Malaysia, in Dataran Merdeka, up to Jalan Raja Laut, and Jalan Tengkodur Ramai.
02:52When we do marketing, we know when we go outside, some people they might know about Malaysia, but they don't
02:57know very detail.
02:58So that is our job, to create more demand towards this market, just to make sure Malaysia is top of
03:05their mind.
03:06For example, if you think Americans wake up tomorrow morning, oh, I want to go to Malaysia.
03:11No, for Americans to take like at least six months for them to decide to come.
03:16We want them to wake up early morning, I want to go to Kuala Lumpur, I want to go to
03:21Lanka, something like that.
03:23Appointed to his post in December last year, Mohamed Amiral Rizal has had little time to settle into the role,
03:30and despite that, he vows to be on the ground visiting tourism hotspots and meeting industry players as his team
03:36works to keep Malaysia visible.
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