Kinmen, March 17 (CNA) The Kinmen County government will hold vocational training courses for tour guides and travel interpreters later this month in an effort to help revive the tourism sector, which has been hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic, the county government said Tuesday.

A total of 123 people had signed up Tuesday, the first day of registration, to attend the training courses, the county's Tourism Department said in a statement.

As Kinmen's tourism sector, one of the mainstays of the local economy, has been taking a direct hit from the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic, the county government decided to offer courses for vocational training of travel interpreters and tour guides to bolster the industry, according to the statement.

The courses will be offered to 120 trainees in two rounds, with the first one scheduled for March 19-25 and the second between March 26-April 1, according to the statement.

The registration started Tuesday and 123 travel and tourism practitioners applied for the classes, including 89 for the first round, which still has 31 slots left, while 34 signed up for the second round, which still has 86 slots available, it said.

The county government will help the trainees apply for vocational training subsidies of NT$800 per day after the completion of the training and the courses will be offered at the county hall from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. per day during the periods, according to Tsai Pai-li (蔡百里), a tourism department official.

(By Amy Huang and Evelyn Kao)Enditem/J