SINGAPORE, November 23: For the first time in 14 years, Singapore is facing THE prospect of a decline in tourist arrivals. Despite the formidable hardsell its tourism department unleashes on holiday-makers, more and more of them seem to be veering away from the cyber city-state. Everyone, that is, except the Indians.

They continue to pour into the lion city in hordes, undeterred by the dampeners that have kept others away. If the haze fobbed off many Americans, Britons and Japanese from visiting Singapore this tourist season, for the Thais and Malaysians next door it was the currency crisis that proved a deterrent.

These twin factors caused visitor arrivals, which had already begun to show a declining trend in September, to drop dramatically by 17.6 per cent in October. Only the Indians appear to have bucked the trend, according to data provided by the Singapore Tourist Promotion Board. Tourist arrivals from India went up by 10 per cent last month, even as the number of visitors from South Korea almost halved, while those from Japan declined by 25 per cent.

Arrivals from the US and Britain went down by 12 per cent. For Singapore, it is a gloomy scenario. The city state has so far recorded an astounding 7 million tourist arrivals annually -- more than double its population. But this year it may be a different story.

The last time a decline occurred was in 1983, when annual arrivals went down by over 100,000. On that occasion, the impending recession was the culprit. This time round, the reasons are vastly different. This October, only 495,327 tourists came, compared to 600,912 in the same period last year.

This casts a shadow over STPB"s projection of a 3-5 per cent growth this year over last year's 7.29 million visitors.

According to STPB's deputy director for marketing communications Michael Lim, in view of the "double whammy" -- the haze and regional currency turmoil -- that hit travel, as he acknowledged in a recent interview, "There is a likelihood that we may see negative growth this year.'' "Without the haze, we would have no problems meeting our target growth for this year."

Lim said that STB's tourism offices overseas were working out promotions and attractively-priced packages with tour operators overseas to draw visitors here.

Unlike vacationers, business travellers seemed unaffected by the haze up to October, said the STPB. The meetings, conventions and exhibitions sector grew significantly, by almost 90 per cent. But far from being stoical, the STPB is seeking to reverse the trend.

Singapore Airlines was working with the board to provide attractive fares for these tour packages over the next three months. All kinds of freebies are being lined up, such as complimentary meals and free airport transfers as well as admissions to tourist attractions and the DisneyFest extravaganza.

The board has also "doubled its efforts" to bring journalists and tour operators from overseas on familiarisation tours, an exercise that the Malaysian government has also initiated. Even without the haze and the currency crisis rearing their head, Singapore had already begun drawing up a contingency plan for contending with a possible plateauing in growth of tourist traffic. Projections had shown that thanks to the strong Singapore dollar which made shopping expensive, holiday makers were not attracted as much this year to the Lion City as they were last year. Apprehensive that Singapore was getting to be a more popular business centre than a tourist destination, STPB launched an aggressive promotional drive, simultaneously indulging in a bout of introspection. And until the haze reared its head, the effort seems to have paid off.

Despite the strong Singapore dollar, tourists were continuing to zero in on the island state. And it is not hard to see why. For a holiday-maker from the West especially, Singapore is a gateway to the East, offering all the comfort and ease they are used to, while still retaining a flavour that is uniquely oriental.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.