Coastal charm: Tourists gathering at Kota Kinabalu’s Tanjung Aru beach, famed for its sunsets and activities.
KOTA KINABALU: The airports in the Borneo states of Sabah and Sarawak have been busy with a huge influx of both international and local tourists.
In Sabah, international arrivals reached 1,162,459, or a 17.2% increase, in the first nine months of this year while domestic arrivals also showed a 16.8% increase, with 1,663,931 arrivals compared to the same period in 2024.
The top five international arrivals were from China (534,975), Brunei (152,136), South Korea (136,949), Indonesia ( 102,554) and Taiwan ( 28,976 ), said Sabah Tourism Board (STB) chief executive officer Julinus J. Jimit.
He said the biggest increase in international arrivals in terms of percentage were from Taiwan (15.4%), Indonesia (14.1%), South Korea (9.3%) and China (2.9%).
Brunei, however, registered a drop of 5.2%.
Sarawak, meanwhile, has seen a boost in domestic tourism this year, with a 12% rise in visitor arrivals from Peninsular Malaysia and Sabah.
As of Sept 15, the state recorded 1.57 million domestic arrivals compared to 1.4 million from January to September last year.
Of this figure, 939,581 came from the peninsula and 628,005 from Sabah, according to the Sarawak Immigration Department.
Julinus said Sabah has achieved 80.8% of its 3.5 million visitor target for 2025.
“We estimate tourism receipts (Jan-Sept 2025) to increase by 17.0% compared to 2024, reaching RM6.58bil,” he said.
There are 126 weekly international flights out of Kota Kinbalau International Airport servicing 14 cities – Singapore, Bandar Seri Begawan, Taipei, Hong Kong, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Shanghai, Beijing, Hangzhou, Fuzhou, Seoul, Manila, Jakarta and Ho Chi Minh.
The airport, in fact, is operating beyond its passenger capacity and efforts are being made to upgrade the airport.
The government approved the KKIA Upgrading Project in November last year to increase passenger handling capacity from nine million to 12 million passengers per annum.
The RM442.30mil upgrade is expected to be done by 2027-28.
Sarawak’s visitor arrivals as of Sept 15 stood at 3.60 million, comparable to the 3.66 million from January to September last year.
Visitors from Brunei continued to be the highest at 1.2 million as of Sept 15, although this is a decline from 1.4 million in the first nine months last year.
The number of Indonesian visitors – the second biggest group – increased from 491,516 to 532,335 in the same period.
China contributed the third highest number of visitors, but it was a slight drop from 55,240 to 50,131.
