Visitor arrivals in the NMI continue to drop; GVB Tumon night market delayed due to weather

Tourism is always a volatile market, with continuous changes across countries and islands in the region. 

The Marianas Visitors Authority reported visitor arrivals dipped further in June to 7,873 compared to 19,665 in June last year, and 42,076 in June 2019. The Northern Mariana Islands received 39 flights from Korea compared to 98 flights in June 2024. Jeju Air’s flights were reduced from two daily flights to one from March 30 and T’way Air suspended its daily flight from Seoul from June 9 to July 6 “as part of [more than] 300 routes suspended globally by the airline due to continued declining profitability,” MVA said.

In related news, the Guam office of the National Weather Service advised tropical disturbance Invest 98W show high likelihood to develop into a tropical depression.  

Due to the pending bad weather in the Mariana Islands, the Guam Visitors Bureau has postponed the launch of the Tumon Night Market to Aug. 3, and the Hotel Association of the Northern Mariana Islands has rescheduled its annual HANMI Charity Golf Tournament to Aug. 9. 
Flights on the Guam-Taiwan route may be boosted by the news that Taiwan will introduce an Online Arrival Card for visitors to streamline the immigration process from Oct. 1. Visitors will need to provide passport details, method of arrival, address in Taiwan, and purpose of travel. Travelers will receive an email with a QR code to present to passport control in Taoyuan International Airport. 

United Airlines flies to Taipei twice weekly as of April 2. China Airlines resumed flights on the Guam-Taipei route from November to February this year, according to Journal files, but has not added flights since then. mbj