No. of foreign tourists to S. Korea up 12.4 pct in March

SEOUL, April 23 (Yonhap) -- The number of foreigners who arrived in South Korea jumped by 12.4 percent in March from a year earlier due to higher numbers of Chinese and Japanese tourists on incentive tours, the local tourism promotion agency said Tuesday. A total of 1.54 million foreigners arrived here last month, compared with 1.36 million a year ago, according to the Korea Tourism Organization (KTO). The number of Chinese tourists shot up 20.9 percent last month from a year earlier to some 488,000, due to an increase in both independent trips and those that are part of package programs, the KTO said. The number of visitors from Japan skyrocketed 27.4 percent on-year to some 375,000 last month, the KTO said. Some 98,000 Taiwanese visited South Korea last month, a gain of 4.7 percent from the previous year. The number of outbound South Korean tourists came to 2.33 million last month, an increase of 3.6 percent from a year ago, the agency said. An influx of foreign visitors is anticipated down the road, as both Japan and China will enjoy lengthy holidays from the end of this month to the first week of May. khj@yna.co.kr (END)