Tourist arrivals in March have witnessed an increase of over 18.5%, year on year.
As per the latest statistics published by the Ministry of Tourism, the highest tourist arrivals were from the European countries which recorded figures amounting to 82,383 tourists till March this year, which is an increase of 33% compared to that period of last year.
According to the latest statistics, Germany recorded the highest tourist arrivals from the European market. The total figure stood at 14,692. While Italy and the United Kingdom ranked second and third with tourist arrivals of 13,198 and 11,829 respectively.
However, tourist arrivals from the Asia Pacific region witnessed a decline of 1.8%. China has remained the country where the highest number of tourists originate from, contributing 9.9% of the total number of tourists who visited Maldives until March. China has recorded 13, 203 as total number of tourists that arrived in Maldives until March this year but this is a huge decline of 27.5% compared to last year where the total tourist arrivals was recorded as 18,203.
As per these statistics, tourist arrivals from the countries of Malaysia and Thailand increased by huge margins of 66% and 108% respectively.
In addition a significant increase in tourist arrivals has been recorded from countries in Oceania, America and Africa. The occupancy for this year stood at 66.4%, while occupancy stood at 64.1% of last year.