According to the data released by the Statistical Service, tourist arrivals in Cyprus experienced an increase of 12% in April 2016 and specifically the number of tourist arrivals in April 2016 was 225,575 compared to 201,495 in April 2015.
Analytically, tourist arrivals from the UK recorded an increase of 9.6% from 83,361 in April 2015 to 91,391 in April 2016, tourist arrivals from Russia recorded a significant 53.4% increase from 25,149 last year to 38,591 this year and tourist arrivals from Israel recorded a 46.6% increase from 8,312 last year to 12,185 this year.
Moreover, tourist arrivals from Germany were also increased by 19.2% from last year as well as tourist arrivals from Poland which recorded a rise by a staggering 62.3%.
However, tourist arrivals from Greece recorded a decrease of 6.4% from 17,825 in April 2015 to 16,685 in April 2016.
The Cyprus Tourist Organisation (CTO) pointed out in a press release that the results of the tourist arrivals for the period May 2015 to April 2016 which peaked at 2,745,000 represents a record of all times for the same period of time.
For the January to April 2016 period, tourist arrivals reached 477,183 compared to 391,483 from the same period of time in 2015 which amounts to an increase of 21.9%.
CTO emphasized that an increase of arrivals was recorded from nearly all the main tourist markets.
Tourism Minister, Mr. George Lakkotrypis, stated after a meeting on Friday the 20th of May 2016 that “all indications are that this year will be the best year ever, both in terms of tourist arrivals and revenue”.
The record high numbers experienced in the tourism sector of Cyprus are encouraging for the stability and growth of the island economy and indicate that he is on the right path to economic sustainability.
