MACAO - Macao's visitor arrivals in March this year reached 2,349,703, up 7.3 percent over the same month of 2011, according to figures released on Wednesday by the city's Statistics and Census Service (DSEC).

The figure showed that visitors from the Chinese mainland increased by 15.4 percent year on year to 1.44 million, with 555,876 traveling to Macao under the Individual Visit Scheme, up by 10.9 percent from March 2011.

Of the total visitor arrivals in March, those from Hong Kong (562,037) and Taiwan (80,911) decreased by 5.1 percent and 16.7 percent respectively, while those from Japan (39,475) and the Republic of Korea (33,965) rose by 15.6 percent and 36 percent respectively, the DSEC figures indicated.

The figure also showed that visitor arrivals totaled 6,942,320 in the first quarter of 2012, up by 7.9 percent year-on-year.