Thursday, the figures released by the Singapore Tourism Board showed that because of the global economic crisis, Singapore's tourism industry declined suddenly in the first half of 2009, as travelers reduced on their spending.

The board said, from January to June, visitor arrivals came to 4.5 million; which if compared to the first half of 2008, dropped by 11.5%.

Tourism receipts were expected at 6.4 billion Singapore dollars (4.43 billion US dollars), a drop of 13.5%.

The board hoped to see visitor arrivals to range from 9 million to 9.5 million for the whole year, compared with 10.1 million in 2008.

A drop of 12 billion to 12.5 billion Singapore dollars, from 2008's 14.8 billion Singapore dollars, were expected in the Tourist receipts.

The board said: "In the first half of 2009, total room revenues of Singapore's hotels reached 721 million Singapore dollars, down 33.2 per cent year-on-year. The overall occupancy rate in the city-state's hotels was 72 per cent for the first half of 2009, a drop of 11.1 percentage points from a year ago."