The group said the reopening of borders was significant for the tourism industry and in line with what it had been pushing for all this while.
“We can finally start rebuilding the tourism sector and contribute to Malaysia’s economic recovery,” Matta president Tan Kok Liang said in a statement.
Earlier, Prime Minister Ismail Sabri Yaakob announced that Malaysia’s borders would reopen on April 1. He also said the country would transition to the endemic phase from the same date.
“Malaysian citizens with valid travel documents could enter and leave the country as they did before the pandemic,” he added.
The country’s borders have been closed since the first movement control order (MCO) in March 2020.
According to Tan, with more than half of the population having received their third dose of the Covid-19 vaccine, “it makes sense to open our borders while maintaining updated SOPs to ensure public health and safety”.
“With a firm date, the industry can now begin its marketing and promotion activities and recall tourism workers in stages,” he said.
He added that tourist spending would also boost the local economy and sub-sectors of the industry.
“The closure of international borders has hit the whole industry hard over the last 24 months. The Langkawi travel bubble and VTL arrangements, although well-meaning, has helped little to support the industry.”
Meanwhile, Malaysian Budget Hotel Association president Emmy Suraya Hussein welcomed the announcement to reopen the country’s borders.
“I’m sure the tourism sector, especially hotel operators, will be happy because we have been waiting for this for a long time,” she said.
Emmy said that the hotel industry could not depend on domestic travellers as occupancy in city hotels was low.
The Malaysian Association of Hotels (MAH) also viewed the news about borders reopening positively.
“We are hopeful that the requirements will be as traveller-friendly as possible,” MAH CEO Yap Lip Seng said.
He added that the country needed to establish VTLs with countries that were not fully open to enable travel on both sides.