Participants will also receive the same educational pack that was launched in the United States in tandem with the film that grossed $ 16.5 million in box office ticket sales since its launch. Sri Lanka Tourism Promotion Bureau Chairman Rohantha Athukorala stated that the initiative will help to further increase the number of Chinese tourists visiting Sri Lanka which during the first half of 2015 grew by 81% to 94,500 arrivals. The overall program will include an education drive concerned with responsible environment management and the importance of biodiversity.
“We are also pursuing if there is a possibility of setting up Monkey Kingdom in the Disneyland Park which is to be set up in Shanghai in 2016. This will give a new positioning to Sri Lanka as a tourist destination. We must attract a quality travelers from the booming Chinese outbound market which is almost 140 million last year. Sri Lanka is targeting 300,000 by 2016 which is just 2% of the market,” Athukorala noted.