TAIPEI - A record-high 2.2356 million people from the Chinese mainland visited Taiwan in 2012, a year-on-year increase of 49 percent, according to statistics released by relevant Taiwan authorities.

Of the mainland visitors, 1.7675 million came in package tours, 190,000 as individual tourists, 50,000 for health checkups or plastic surgeries, 75,600 for business and 151,500 for other professional purposes.

The number of visitors in package tours rose by 43 percent year-on-year, and the number of individual tourists is 5.3 times of that last year.

December 30, 2012 saw the highest number of daily visits from the mainland for the year, 1,760, to the island.