Malaysia’s hotel sector is progressing towards recovery, similar to the overall travel and tourism sector.

According to Datin Christina Toh, president of the Malaysian Association of Hotels, hotels across many states have seen improvements due to the increase in international tourist arrivals.

“Hotels located within city centres, especially those in the Klang Valley, have been seeing good occupancy rates,” she told StarBiz.

“It’s not quite pre-pandemic levels yet, where the overall average occupancy rate was around 70%.”

The average occupancy rate for hotels is around the mid-60% mark.

“Hotels in the city centres have improved tremendously. It’s almost pre-pandemic. However, some smaller states have not hit that level yet.”

Between July and August, occupancy rates at three to five-star hotels in Kuala Lumpur's city centre have surged to over 80%, The Star reports.

“It’s the summer holidays and these hotels have been benefiting from both international tourists and investors,” she said.

Toh added that the increase in tourist arrivals to the country can also be credited to the relaxation of visa restrictions for travellers from India and China.

“As such, there has been greater awareness among Indian and Chinese tourists and a lot of popular destinations have been getting good traction,” she said.

Indeed, Tourism Malaysia reported that approximately 537,000 tourists from India travelled to Malaysia between January and June this year, marking a 51.6% increase from the 354,000 during the same period in 2019.

In addition, tourism expenditure in Malaysia has exceeded pre-pandemic levels.

According to Tourism Malaysia data, tourism receipts increased from RM41.69 billion in January to June 2019 to RM45.42 billion during the same period this year.