Malaysia recorded a total of 1,894,059 tourist arrivals for the month of May 2009. The figure represents a 0.3% decrease from the 1,899,148 tourist arrivals for the same month in 2008. 

Cumulatively, tourist arrivals recorded from January to May 2009 were 9,238,116, representing an increase of 2.6% compared to 9,001,765 for the same period in 2008.

        Table 1: Comparison of tourist arrivals to Malaysia

        (May 2008 and 2009)

          Source: Immigration Department of Malaysia      

       Table 2: Comparison of tourist arrivals to Malaysia

       (January – May 2008 and 2009)

          Source: Immigration Department of Malaysia

For the month of May 2009, double digit growth was recorded for tourist arrivals from Iran (96.5%), France (58.6%), the United Kingdom (50.3%), Netherlands (46.6%), Germany (38.9%), Italy (35.8%), Canada (31.9%), Vietnam (29.2%), Russia (25.0%), Australia (23.2%), Turkey (19.4%), the Philippines (16.3%), Cambodia (15.1%) and Brunei (12.2%).    

Among the markets that have registered a decline were China, Japan and  South Korea. 

The top ten tourist generating markets from January to May 2009 were: Singapore (4,917,869), Indonesia (910,733), Thailand (626,589), Brunei (460,089), China (including Hong Kong & Macau) (408,334), India (231,581), Australia (190,581), the Philippines (186,797), the United Kingdom (169,758) and Japan (157,298).

Regions that have continued to show growth were ASEAN, West Asia, Oceania and Europe.