The combination of a booming economy and easing of travel restrictions from China and South Korea have tourism marketing officials predicting the number of travelers arriving in Hawai'i from those two Asian nations will double within two years.

The upbeat assessment was delivered yesterday at the Hawai'i Tourism Authority's spring marketing update at the Hawai'i Convention Center.

"Korea is exploding," said Michael Merner, managing director of Hawai'i tourism marketing for South Korea, China and Taiwan.

Travel from that country has been hampered because visitors needed a visa, but South Korea is expected to be admitted to the U.S. State Department's visa waiver program in early 2009.

Merner said Canada's tourist numbers skyrocketed when it included South Korea in its visa-waiver program in 1994, with an 81 percent increase in arrivals the first year.

He said South Korea is an especially promising market because of the large number of people there who like to travel. Last year, he said, 13 million South Korea residents traveled overseas out of the entire population of 48 million. That's 28 percent of the total population.

Merner said travel has been helped by a strong economy there and a reduction in the workweek from six to five days.

State statistics show South Korean visitors to Hawai'i have been rising steadily, even with the restrictions: 30,000 in 2005, 37,777 in 2006 and 41,819 last year. Merner predicts that figure will reach 110,000 within two years of the visa waiver.

David Uchiyama, HTA vice president of tourism marketing. emphasized the importance of marketing partnerships coming out of a year that saw a dip in visitor arrivals in Hawai'i — down 1.2 percent or about 93,000 visitors fewer than in 2006 — after two booming years.

Merner said Hawai'i already is working on various programs to prepare, including training people here in the Korean and Chinese languages and in cultural sensitivities. "There is a huge language barrier," he said. So the state is working to prepare brochures, Web sites, etc., in these languages.

He predicted that the needs will grow steadily, giving the industry time to adapt, although some needs already are emerging as hotels start to train front-desk staff to be more fluent in these languages.

As this tourism segment grows, hotels, airlines and visitor attractions will need to begin to offer information in the native languages of these visitors, much as they have done for Japanese travelers over the years.

The other big news is China, which still has a visa requirement but recently signed a memorandum of understanding with the U.S. that will allow leisure travel groups to come to the United States by June of this year.

Again, Merner predicts a doubling of visitors from China, to more than 100,000 a year. Those numbers have climbed each year, from 25,443 in 2003 to 55,910 last year.

And the profile of the visitors has changed. "The old image that Chinese don't spend is going out the window," Merner said.

As recently as four years ago, Chinese travelers showed a preference for lower-priced one-star hotels. But he said the most recent statistics show that "50 percent of Chinese outbound travelers in 2007 stayed in four- or five-star hotels."

Some challenges remain, including a lack of direct flights from China to Hawai'i and airfares that increased 20 to 70 percent last year.

Visitors from China will still need a visa, and that price just went up 30 percent to $131; the process takes four to six weeks and interviews will only be done at five U.S. visa offices in China.

Reach Robbie Dingeman at rdingeman@honoluluadvertiser.com.