TORONTO — Singapore Tourism Board in conjunction with Indus Travels held a travel agent presentation in Toronto this week to showcase what’s new in Singapore and the five package tours that Indus Travels offers.

Singapore will celebrate its Golden Jubilee as an independent nation on Aug. 9, 2015 and there will be many festivals and events planned throughout 2015.

In 2014 there were 73,281 visits by Canadians to Singapore, a slight increase of 0.6% over the previous year. In the first quarter of this year there have been 31,304 visitor arrivals from Canada – a minor decrease of 0.1% from the same period in 2014.

Susan Krulic, manager, tourism business, Americas, for the Singapore Tourism Board told agents, “The last five years Singapore has experienced tremendous growth and it’s a great year to send your clients to Singapore with the Golden Jubilee happening.” Lonely Planet has designated Singapore as the number one destination to visit in 2015.

Despite its small size of only 715 square km the island nation has many attractions and cultural pursuits. It is becoming a culinary destination with various celebrity chef restaurants now open featuring numerous ethnic cuisines for visitors to sample. Known as a business centre dotted with office towers, Singapore is surprisingly a very green city with nearly half of Singapore covered in greenery and has the largest tropical orchid garden in the world.

Krulic says the focus for Singapore Tourism Board (which doesn’t have a Canadian office) in Canada is working with tour operators such as Indus and developing packages for agents to sell.

Harish Shroff, business development manager – East Coast, for Indus Travels says the operator has five packages which feature stays in Singapore. The biggest seller is the 15-day/13-night ‘Best of Vietnam, Cambodia & Singapore’ tour priced at US$3,495 per person out of Los Angeles.

For further information on Singapore, visit yoursingapore.com or Indus Travels at indus.travel.