Tourism operators in Sabah, Malaysia, put on a brave face amid plunge in visitors and a second coronavirus lockdown
- The appeal of the Borneo region’s natural beauty and wildlife will endure, but will its tour operators?
- Borders are still shut, visitor numbers fell 70 per cent in 2020 and Sabah is back in lockdown, with only essential businesses open. Yet optimism persists
With its year-round equatorial climate, Sabah in Malaysian Borneo has become an increasingly popular destination for tourists from around the world.
Its natural beauty, some of the most diverse wildlife in Asia, and its ethnic diversity – at least 30 ethnic groups live there – as well as its exotic headhunting past, have made Sabah an alluring destination.
Kota Kinabalu, the capital city, is the gateway to the state for 90 per cent of those visitors. Currently, though, no one is using that gateway. On January 13, Sabah went into its second two-week lockdown – now extended – since the coronavirus pandemic began, under what is known as a movement control order (MCO).
The first MCO was issued in March 2020 and, coupled with Malaysia’s closing of its international borders, delivered a hammer blow to Sabah’s tourist industry. Much of it was effectively mothballed.
We’re at between 2 to 5 per cent of our regular bookings. We’ve made staff pay cuts of up to 50 per cent and put some staff on unpaid leave.
Visitor numbers in the first nine months of 2020 were down nearly 70 per cent from a year earlier, says David Michael, communications manager for the Sabah Tourism Board.
“Between January and December 2019 we had 4.08 million visitors. For 2020, we only have data from January to September, with 948,651 arrivals [mostly domestic tourists]. For the same period in 2019, the number of arrivals was 3,111,884.”
