New S$10million fly-cruise fund to bolster Singapore’s hub dream

In order to become the cruise hub it’s always dreamed of, three Singapore bodies have joined forces to set up a S$10 million fund to encourage cruise companies to use Singapore as a home port.

The Singapore Fly-Cruise Development Fund (FCDF), backed by the Singapore Tourism Board (STB), the Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore (CAAS) and the Singapore Cruise Centre (SCC), is designed to encourage major international cruise companies to partner Singapore in product development and marketing initiatives and can be used to promote products to in-market travel agents or to fund promotions and publicity.

The first company to tap into the fund is Costa Cruises, which is home-porting two ships in Asia for the first time.

The Costa Allegra, which called into Singapore on May 23, will be home-ported in Hong Kong and Shanghai this summer, and target the mainland market.

And this winter, Costa Cruises will bring out the Costa Marina for a three-month stint out of Singapore waters.

Costa Marina will offer five Asian cruises out of Singapore with itineraries ranging from 11 to 15 days. These cruises will call on ports in Brunei, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam.

Together with the STB, Costa will conduct a series of marketing seminars for travel agencies and other selected marketing channels. Through local Costa Cruises preferred sales agent (PSA) representatives and eight STB regional offices in Asia, these seminars will promote fly-cruise options through Singapore and increase the awareness of cruise as an attractive holiday option.

In announcing the fund at the welcome party for the Costa Allegra, Dr Vivian Balakrishnan, Minister for Community Development, Youth and Sports and Second Minister for Trade and Industry, said, “Asia currently accounts for about 5% of the world cruising market. It offers great potential for growth – not only in providing new destinations for Western cruise passengers, but also by being a new source of cruise passengers.

“In fact, cruise passengers in the Asia Pacific region are expected to grow by more than 40% from 1.07 million in 2005 to 1.5 million by 2010.”

Dr Balakrishnan said there was a need to work together and market the whole region as a compelling destination so that major cruise lines would anchor and homeport their ships in the region.

“Since a cruise ship will typically call on at least 4 to 5 ports, there is much synergy to be reaped by collaborating together to grow and develop the region collectively.”

He said the STB and other tourism boards in Asia had begun producing joint marketing materials and would be establishing a stronger presence at international trade events such as the Seatrade Cruise Shipping Convention in Miami.

Sharing Singapore’s vision to be the preferred cruise hub of Asia, the Minister said the fly-cruise concept worked in favour of Singapore with Changi Airport already linked to more than 180 cities in over 50 countries.

“When Terminal 3 begins operations in 2008, Changi Airport will have an annual handling capacity of more than 64 million passengers a year.”

Dr Balakrishnan said the FCDF was a significant step towards realizing STB’s Tourism 2015 targets of 17 million visitor arrivals and S$30 billion tourism receipts.

In 2005, Singapore’s top cruise source markets were India (63,000 visitors), and Australia and Indonesia (26,000 visitors each). Fly-cruise passengers have also increased by almost 53% from 106,000 in 1996 to more than 161,000 in 2005.

Mr Massimo Brancaleoni, Vice President, Pacific Asia Operations, Costa Cruises said, “Costa is investing and promoting the cruise business in the Pacific Asia region as part of its business development strategy and plan to expand the operational areas for its fleet.

“Growth for the Pacific Asia region is expected to increase to 1.5 million by 2010 from the 1 million cruise passengers in 2005. We are delighted that STB shares our vision regarding the huge potential of cruise industry development in the region.”