Visitors to duty-free shops fall to lowest since pandemic in Jan.
SEOUL, March 1 (Yonhap) -- The number of visitors to South Korea's duty-free stores fell to the lowest level in January since the COVID-19 pandemic hit the nation a year earlier, industry data showed Monday.
A total of 343,983 people visited local duty-free stores in January, with 59,627 of them coming from abroad, according to the data from the Korea Duty Free Shops Association (KDFA).
The monthly figure was the lowest since the country first reported a confirmed case of the novel virus in January 2020.
The duty-free industry was one of the sectors worst hit by the pandemic, with the number of visitors in January this year shrinking to less than one-tenth of the 3.83 million visitors in the same month last year, the KDFA said.
Last year, the number of visitors kept sliding from 1.75 million in February, 587,879 in March and 354,362 in April, as the nation imposed travel restrictions to rein in the spread of the coronavirus, the association said.
ejkim@yna.co.kr
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