SLOWER GROWTH IN NUMBERS BUT HIGHER GROWTH IN EARNINGS MAKE 2018 ANOTHER GOOD YEAR FOR THE SEYCHELLES
(Posted 21st December 2018)
With less than two weeks to go, and the most busy season of the year just opening up ahead of the Festive Season, has Seychelles’ tourism industry reason to celebrate once again.
According to data received from the National Bureau of Statistics there has been 2% increase in visitor’s arrival compared to the same period in 2017 with 325,628 arrivals so far compared to 320,132 last year.
Notably has Switzerland replaced India among the six top best performing markets during 2018.
Arrivals by country of origin of tourist visitors, for the top six markets, were: Germany 53,127
France 40,806
UK /N.Ireland 24,369
UAE 23,259
Italy 22,547
Switzerland 12,081
The advance of German over French visitors has been largely blamed on the lacklustre performance of French airlines JOON which had in collusion with Seychelles government departments pushed Air Seychelles off the route – to only recently announce that their flights will now only be seasonal and not year round.
Germany subsequently remains the main tourist source market for the Seychelles now with a 16% market share and having replaced France as the archipelago’s leading source market for many years.
Data seen also suggests that there has been a decline in the number of visitors from some important markets such as China, Russia and South Africa.
On the upside though, even though the increase in visitor number has slowed down from previous double digit rises year on year, has the Central Bank of Seychelles reported an increase in the tourism earnings for the current years. Consolidated figures released show a 5.1 million USD equivalent tourism related income or in local currency 7.1 billion Seychelles Rupees.
In 2017 the comparable tourism earnings were 4.4 million USD equivalent to 5.9 billion Seychelles Rupees.
These data suggest that visitors spent more on a per capita basis than last year, rooted in higher accommodation tariffs and greater spending on location.
