Tourist arrivals up 27.6%

By Mario Andree

Ceylon FT: Tourist arrivals in the first four months of this year increased 27.6% to 534,132 up from 418,456 a year earlier as arrivals in April reached 112,631, up 39.5% from 80,737 recorded in 2013, data released by the Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority showed.

After successfully surpassing last year’s 1.2 million tourist arrivals goal, thanks to a data revision, the government and the hospitality industry hopes to welcome more than 1.5 million this year.

Aiming at increasing the country’s GDP to US$ 100 billion with a per capita income of US$ 4,000, the government hopes the income generated through the tourism industry would reach US$ 2.7 billion by 2016 with 2.5 million arrivals to the country. Last year, Sri Lanka earned 1.7 billion, up 35% from 1.3 in 2012 with more than 1.27 million arrivals.India continued to lead tourist arrivals to Sri Lanka with 71,346 arrivals recorded during the first four months of this year followed by 51,415 visitors from the United Kingdom and 41,101 from Germany.

Regionally, Western Europe lead tourist arrivals followed by South Asia and East Asia.
Overall tourist arrivals for the four months from North America increased 13.7% to 23,954 from 21,062 with arrivals in April up 25.0% to 5,514 from 33,204, while arrivals from Latin America and the Caribbean increased 38.6% to 1,390 from 1,003 with arrivals in April up 20.6% to 281 from 233.

Arrivals from Western Europe, which continues to be the largest market for Sri Lanka, increased 18.5% to 181,129 from 152,914 with arrivals in April up 47.9% to 37,369 from 25,259, while arrivals from Eastern Europe increased 51.1% to 77,265 from 51,129 with arrivals in April up 24.8% to 10,844 from 8,687.

Tourist arrivals from Africa increased 75.1% to 3,576 from 2,042 supported by a 145% growth in April to 1,083 from 442, while arrivals from the Middle East increased 16.9% to 23,692 from 20,275 with arrivals in April up 24.8% to 5,302 from 4,248.

Arrivals from East Asia, the third largest market, increased 54.7% to 91,055 from 58,870 with arrivals in April up 61.4% to 18,416 from 11,409, while arrivals from South Asia increased 20.0% to 112,232 from 93,547 with arrivals in April up 28.0% to 27,954 from 21,837.

Arrivals from Australasia increased 12.6% to 19,839 from 17,614 with arrivals in April up 39.3% to 5,868 from 4,211.
Deputy Minister of Investment Promotions Faizer Mustpha, who last week highlighted that potential investors have raised concerns over the contrivances pertaining to the three projects which were alleged to include casinos, said that the country was aiming to increase the number of hotel rooms by 35,000 by 2016 and some constructions were taking place.

Refusing to divulge any further details he said that there were several hospitality projects in the pipeline which were awaiting negotiation and approvals.
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Source: http://www.sltda.lk/node/704