THE national recovery council today proposed that the country’s borders be reopened to foreign visitors on January 1, 2022, at the latest in a bid to expedite the economic recovery of the country, especially the tourism sector.

Chairman Muhyiddin Yassin said the special committee on pandemic management chaired by Prime Minister Ismail Sabri Yaakob would identify the countries, especially those with high rates of complete vaccination against Covid-19, with which to allow travel.

“They (committee) will choose the countries that have managed to control the transmission of Covid-19 and have high vaccination rates… only visitors from those countries will be allowed to enter our country,” he said after chairing the fifth meeting of the council in Putrajaya today.

He said the decision to open the borders was also prompted by the excellent performance of the national immunisation programme, which saw 95% of the adult population and almost 67.7% of the adolescent population inoculated.

Muhyiddin said the country’s tourism sector had seen a relatively slow recovery due to the lack of international tourist arrivals and the fact that most of the industry players needed time and resources to resume their businesses.

“Our tourism sector will lose almost RM90 million in revenue if the borders were to remain closed. That is how much foreign visitors are worth,” he said.

He said other countries like Germany, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States, despite still struggling with Covid-19, had already allowed entry to travellers from Malaysia as most of their people were vaccinated.

“So, if we compare ourselves with those countries, our vaccination rate is among the highest in the world, and we should also benefit from that by allowing foreign tourists to come to our country.

“At the same time, we also have to be vigilant and continue to comply with the standard operating procedures,” he said. – November 11, 2021.