KUCHING: The Rainforest World Music Festival (RWMF), which ended on Sunday (June 19), has achieved its visitor target, much to the delight of Sarawak Tourism, Creative Industry and Performing Arts Minister Datuk Seri Abdul Karim Rahman Hamzah.
He said of the 12,000 festival-goers, 92 per cent were locals and the rest, foreigners, with also 41 countries involved in the festival physically.
“On the first day, we had about 2,000 visitors; second day, we had 7,000 and today, we got another 3,000 visitors. I was not expecting this but to my surprise, many had come over to Sarawak to enjoy the show. Top five physical attendees were (from) Malaysia, Singapore, the United Kingdom, Indonesia and Australia.
“Among the other countries involved were Spain, Russia, Japan and Brunei, while virtual tickets were mostly sold to countries such as China, Australia, the United States and Sweden,” he said at a press conference at the Sarawak Cultural Village here, Sunday evening.
Abdul Karim added that part of the proceeds of the ticket sales from the three-day event would be donated to support wildlife conservation in Sarawak.
On another note, he said Sarawak was looking forward to Brunei lifting its ban on cross-border land travel on Aug 1.
He also commented on the Kalimantan-Sarawak travel routes and said the state government would be looking into ways to ease the travel experience and would probably build a small airport in the near future.
Meanwhile, federal Tourism, Arts and Culture Minister Datuk Seri Nancy Shukri said the number of visitors from overseas was not encouraging as many countries still imposed mandatory quarantine and this deterred people from travelling.
“But, I am confident that by next year, the festival would be able to attract more foreign visitors as the ministry has been actively promoting Malaysia as a tourist destination, including RWMF as one of the attractions.
“We opened the borders last April and starting May, the SOPs (standard operating procedures for entry) have been more flexible, and it’s probably the best SOPs you (tourists) can get in the world,” she added.
Themed ‘25th Legendary Rainforest Celebration’, the iconic festival from June 17 to 19 featured musicians from countries like China, Australia, India, Singapore, Indonesia, Canada, Estonia, Italy, Japan, Madagascar, the United States and Vietnam.
