Over 39,000 tourist arrivals in first 2 weeks of 2022 | Daily News

Over 39,000 tourist arrivals in first 2 weeks of 2022

Russia biggest source market
Over 194,000 arrivals in 2021
Global Promotional Campaign to be launched

Tourism Minister Prasanna Ranatunga says that 39,172 tourists have arrived in Sri Lanka in the first two weeks of this year.

The Minister pointed out that the highest number of tourists to arrive in the country during these 14 days were from the Russian Federation. The Minister said 6,963 tourists have arrived in the country during the past two weeks from the Russian Federation.

The number of tourists who visited the country during last year (2021) during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic was 194,495. Of this number, the highest number of tourists visited the country during the last three months of last year. The number of tourists who visited the country during those three months was 156,571.

In addition to the Russian Federation, tourist arrivals to Sri Lanka in the last two weeks were reported from India, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, Germany, France, the Maldives, Australia, Poland and the United States respectively.

Minister Ranatunga pointed out that special promotional programmes were launched in Russia, Ukraine, England, Germany and France to boost tourism and as a result, the number of tourists coming to Sri Lanka from those countries had seen an increase. Several airlines have launched new flights to Colombo, increasing the number of inbound seats available.

The Minister said that with the increase in tourist arrivals, some of the problems faced by those engaged in the industry are being alleviated. He said the Government was taking all possible steps to increase the number of tourist arrivals to the country. This year, Sri Lanka is already planning to participate in tourism exhibitions in various parts of the world. In addition, the Tourism Promotion Bureau plans to implement special promotion programmes in identified countries.

“A global promotional programme targeting high end markets is expected to be launched in the first quarter of this year,” the Minister said.


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