Tourist statistics cap off a successful 2019, with increase in Indian markets

Statistics published by the Tourism Ministry has shown an increase in the number of visitors from the Indian market, making it the market that progressed the most in 2019.

The Maldives received 166,015 visitors from India according to the statistics from the Maldives Immigration registered Tourist Facilities at the Tourism Ministry.

This is an increase of 83.5 percent when compared with the previous year. The increase also means that India became the second biggest market for the Maldives. Previously, India had been ranked as the fifth-biggest market. 2019 saw India share 9.7 percent of the total tourist arrivals to the Maldives.

The increase in tourist arrivals from India can be attributed to the close relationship shared between the two nations. Operations of airlines such as GoAir, Spice Jet, Air India, and Maldivian, which carry tourist arrivals to the Maldives can also be a factor that resulted in the surge.

China is still the country from which the highest number of tourists arrived in the Maldives, taking a market share of 16 percent. Italy is the country from which the highest number of tourists arrived the most from with 8 percent of the market share. Fourth-placed is Germany, with 7.7 percent, the United Kingdom was placed fifth with 7.4 percent.

Based on continents, Maldives saw 49 percent of tourists arrive from Europe and 41 percent from Asia. Only 5 percent of tourists arrived from the American continent.

The Maldives reached its target of 1.5 million tourists 38 days before the year ended and had welcomed more than 1.6 million tourists by the middle of December.

The country welcomed the 1.7 millionth tourist on December 31, 2019, marking an extremely successful year that Tourism Minister Ali Waheed stated would be overtaken by 2020 if the government policies and strategic action plan are executed accordingly.

According to the Tourism Ministry, Maldives received 171,292 tourists in December alone. Last year marked the most successful year in terms of tourist arrivals and was a 14.7 percent increase from 2018.