Mainland tourists to Taiwan up 43 pct in first nine months

Chinese mainland visitors to Taiwan reached 2.39 million in the first nine months of 2014, up 42.86 percent year on year, a mainland official said on Thursday.

The number of individual tourists from the Chinese mainland to Taiwan hit 835,400 in the same period, a rise of 140 percent year on year, said Liu Kezhi, secretary general of the mainland-based Association for Tourism Exchange across the Taiwan Straits.

Mainland people who signed up for organized group package tours to Taiwan reached 1.56 million in the first nine months, Liu said at a press conference on the Taipei tourism exhibition, which will open Friday.

The exhibition, co-organized by the Association for Tourism Exchange across the Taiwan Straits and the Taiwan Visitor Association, will see a 650-strong delegation from the tourism industries of the mainland's 29 provincial-level regions and the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps.

The Taipei tourism exhibition has served as a vital platform to boost cooperation between tourist industries across the Strait since it was initiated in 2006, said Liu.

The number of Taiwan visitors to the mainland has maintained steady growth, with 3.97 million traveling to the mainland in the first nine months of 2014, or an increase of 3.6 percent year on year, he said.