Bagan draws over 400,000 visitors by mid-Nov

ACCORDING to the Directorate of Hotels and Tourism (Bagan Branch), more than 400,000 local and foreign travellers flocked to the World Heritage Site, Bagan Ancient Cultural Zone until the third week of November 2024.

There are 86 hotels and guesthouses in Bagan, and a total of 410,122 visitors — 397,329 local travellers and 12,793 tourists visited Bagan from January to 19 November. The site was crowded with visitors to Thadingyut and Tazaungdine festivals, and there were about 500,000 visitors including day trippers and those who stayed at other places.

There were 2.19 million visitors to Shwezigon Pagoda and 932,424 visitors to Bu Pagoda in 2023. There were 2.77 million visitors to Shwezigon Pagoda and 973,779 visitors to Bu Pagoda between 1 January to 19 November 2024. Therefore, these digits show an increase in traveller arrivals this year.

During the four-day Tazaungdine Festival, 353,323 local and foreign visitors travelled to Shwezigon Pagoda and 170,586 visitors to Bu Pagoda.

Bagan region hosts a higher number of visitors year by year, and the Directorate of Hotels and Tourism (Bagan Branch) and departmental officials cooperate to ensure the sustainability of the ancient cultural zone, cleanliness, reputation, peaceful pilgrimage and systematic disposal of litter. Moreover, they created vendors and baggers-free zones before the Tazaungdine festival, so the local and foreign visitors enjoyed peaceful pilgrimages.

“We can see an increase in number of visitors to Bagan than previous years. We keep conducting educational programmes regarding restaurants, hotels, motels, guesthouses, sellers and other relevant people in different sectors. If we have supervisory and responsibility, accountability and create trips full of responsibility, the number of visitors might keep growing. The visitor arrivals are still high until the third week of November this year is such a pride for Bagan region,” said U Myo Myint Aung, assistant director of the department.

The Bagan Ancient Cultural Zone is now ready with the festivals of Nadaw and Pyatho expecting a surge in the arrivals of local and foreign travellers.

Nyein Thu (MNA)/KTZH

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