Chinese tourists to Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka has a lot of potential, as good as the Maldives, to attract dozens of Chinese travellers but a group of top, visiting travel agents says much needs to be done before this could be achieved. China is the Maldives' biggest source market with nearly 200,000 tourists in 2011, against just 41,500 in 2008 compared to Sri Lanka which attracted only 16,000 last year with half of them being workers. "The travel industry (on both sides) did a lot of promotion of the Maldives and in just 2-3 years it increased by over 100,000 visitors. The same can happen in Sri Lanka if there is a coordinated promotional effort," said Sketic (one name) from Shenzhen Shenhua International Travel Service. Sword Lai, Vacations Division Product Manager at China International Travel Service Shenzhen Co Ltd among China's top three travel agencies, told the Business Times that while Sri Lanka has some fantastic offerings and is 'such a compact destination', the key is communications.