(UDHAYAM, COLOMBO) – Sri Lanka’s tourist arrivals declined in May by 2.5 percent compared to the same period last year, the data released today by the Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority (SLTDA) showed.
The month recorded 121,891 tourists arriving in the country compared to the 125,044 arrived in May 2016.
Arrivals from North America fell 2.6 percent to 6,676 in May while the arrivals from Western Europe increased marginally by 0.2 percent to 26,892 during the month. Most of the tourists came from UK (8,520), followed by Germany (6,351), and France (3,735). While arrivals from Germany declined 16.3 percent, arrivals from France increased by 13.8 percent and from UK by 1.3 percent.
Arrivals from Eastern Europe declined by 9.0 percent with the arrival of 4,835 tourists in May 2017. Arrivals from Russia declined 29.3 percent during the month while 20.7 percent more Ukrainians arrived in the island.
Tourist arrivals from Middle East declined 46.1 percent with the arrival of 3,326 visitors.
Tourist arrivals from East Asia increased 13.2 percent as 31,269 visited the country compared to the 27,612 visited in May 2016. Arrivals from China increased 15.6 percent with 18,494 arriving last month.
Arrivals from South Asia also declined 7.7 percent with 43,511 tourists visiting the island. Arrivals from India declined marginally by 0.3 percent to 34,167 compared to May 2016.
In the first five months of this year tourist arrivals increased by 4.8 percent with the arrival of 887,093 tourists compared to the 846,229 arrived during the same period last year.
Although lower than the target of 2.2 million for the year, Sri Lanka’s tourist arrivals in 2016 rose 14.0 percent with over 2.05 million tourists arrived in the island contributing US$ 3.52 billion of earnings to the government revenues.
Sri Lanka’s Tourism Authority has set a target of 2.5 million tourist arrivals this year.
Courtesy: Colombo Page
