SABAH TOURISM PROMOTION CORPORATION CHAIRMAN'S MESSAGE 

14th April 2001

I have the pleasure to witness today the launching of two very important websites for the Tourism Industry in Sabah.

The first one. MATTASABAH.COM relates to the suppliers of Tourism services in Sabah. Namely the list of tour operators. Travel Agents who are members of MATTA or Malaysian Association of Tour and Travel Agents and news/ happening of the Tourism Industry.

I understand and that there are some thirty-five members who are already sponsoring this Website.

I also understand that this is the first such Website for a Matta Chapter in Malaysia. I Congratulate Sabah Chapter for recognizing the potential of developing a website to top into the global market.

With this website any costumer of Tour wholesaler from anywhere in the world will have a direct access round the clock to the list of Tour Companies in Sabah which are able to offer their specialized services from adventure. Culture to nature-whether it be services for Mice. Ecotourism. Diving or Golf packages.

With this website you will all be able to keep the market place informed of the up to date news of situation in Sabah. many potential tourists out there in the market still do not know where Sabah is and if they know they often get the wrong information and the negative news from the Media.

This website will hopefully be used by you to ensure that the correct and up to date news is deseminated to the market so that Tourist Tour operators are correctly informed.

I can only encourage more of you to take advantage of this marketing tool to promote Sabah and to promote your own Company.

I understand that the second website SABAHTRAVELGUIDE.COM is a portal for E- Commerce transaction over the Internet.I also understand that the website will also be featuring all the various Tourism products in Sabah as well the Tour packages put together by Tour operators.

I am very happy to note that Matta Sabah Chapter has taken this initiative to promote Sabah on the electronic media and to exploit the full potential of the Internet by forming a smart partnership with the IBIZ SOLUTIONS to complement the Government and Sabah Tourism in Promoting Sabah on the Internet. The government and Sabah Tourism fully supports and endorse this project.

With the rapid changes in the Tourism Industry. The tour operators have now got adopt new technology in order to stay competitive. You have to capitalize on this new technology to bring your customers closer to you offer greater value with minimum cost.

I am aware that the travel industry especially the ticketing agents are undergoing tremendous changes in recent times with plans by MAS and other Airlines to reduce ticketing commission and eventually to abolish it completely. Agents will have to diversify to survive in time to come.

As there are more than 110 Matta members in Sabah including ticketing. inbound and outbound, I hope that those of you who are diversifying into inbound business will enter the business with intention to specialize on a niche market there is little room for those companies to enter in the market by price undercutting which will only cause the quality and service to suffer.

As Sabah is promoted as an Ecotourism destination many of our Tourist attractions have limited carrying capacity. This including Sipadan. Selingan Island Sapi Island poring among others. 

But Sabah has a lot of new Tourism products to offer to potential Tourits. Some of these have yet to be tapped. I encourage you to tap into this market you will have to take risk and be creative to explore and develop new products in order to capture new markets.

The launching of the SABAHTRAVELGUIDE.COM portal is thus and important step in this direction as it enables new Tourism products to be launched in the International market.

I hope you will be able to fully tap this market and I wish you all success in developing and marketing your website.

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