Penang challenges DOSM's tourism report, citing more accurate hotel stay data

New Straits Times

03-07-2025

GEORGE TOWN: The Penang government has responded with concern to the recently released Domestic Tourism Survey 2024 by the Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM).
It questioned the accuracy and methodology of the report, particularly its claim that Perak topped the list of domestic tourism destinations.
State Tourism and Creative Economy Committee chairman Wong Hon Wai said the DOSM report was merely based on a sample survey, not on hotel stay records.
He said it was essential to understand that the survey was based on household sampling, which mainly relied on questionnaire answers and memory recall of respondents, and not tangible real-time records.
"While such surveys are common in research, their accuracy is always limited by the sample size and its representativeness.
"In this case, only 204 enumeration blocks in Penang were included in the national survey's total of 2,819 blocks across Malaysia, a figure too small to draw valid conclusions about tourism performance in the state.
"Such a small sample size cannot reflect the real strength of Penang's tourism," he said today.
Wong pointed to the official hotel accommodation data from Tourism Malaysia as a more reliable indicator.
He said last year, Penang recorded 5.2 million domestic tourists staying in hotels, with an additional three million international visitors — totaling 8.2 million hotel guests.
In contrast, he said, Perak, which ranked first in the DOSM report, recorded only 4.19 million domestic hotel guests in the same year.
"This shows a clear discrepancy between the sample-based survey and actual tourism performance data," he added.
Wong also questioned the choice of survey respondents, saying DOSM's data was collected from households, not actual travellers.
Respondents were asked to recall travel activities over the past year, making the data subjective and retrospective," he explained.
Additionally, he emphasised that no surveys were conducted at airports, hotels or tourism hotspots — which would have provided a more accurate picture of active tourists.
Another key issue highlighted by Wong was DOSM's broad definition of a domestic tourist, which included both overnight visitors and same-day excursionists.
He added that same-day visitors, who made up 66.8 per cent of domestic travellers in the DOSM report, typically spent less, did not stay in hotels overnight and were harder for tourism businesses to keep track of.
"Although their numbers are high, their economic impact is minimal compared with genuine leisure travellers," he said.
As such, Wong cautioned against relying solely on the DOSM report to assess tourism success.
"While the survey can offer preliminary insights into trends, its limitations in methodology, sample size and definitions make it insufficient to measure the true performance of major tourism destinations.
"For a state like Penang — known for its high-quality tourism, cultural experiences and world-class arts events — the sector's contribution cannot be captured through a single household survey," Wong said.