Malta outperforming Med destinations

Malta saw an increase of 20 per cent in arrivals in June, while Spain, Cyprus and Croatia saw much more tepid increases of 1.7 per cent, 5.5 per cent, and 0.6 per cent respectively, and Tunisia seeing a drop of 2.2 per cent. When the figures for January to June are analysed, Malta’s performance is even more impressive with Spain, Cyprus and Tunisia all seeing declines as their recovery started much later.

Parliamentary Secretary for Tourism Mario de Marco analysed the figures released by the National Statistics Office earlier on Tuesday, during a press briefing following a tour of the Westin Dragonara Resort with the Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi.

He noted that the 136,758 tourists who visited Malta in June set a new record for the month, 5.7 per cent higher than the previous June record set in 2008.

The recovery in numbers means little on its own. Just as important is the fact that guest nights were up to over 1 million (+8.8%) while tourist expenditure was also up by €4.7 million (+5.3%).

Looking at the year to date, Dr de Marco noted that there was only 1 month which saw poor performance – April – when the volcanic ash disrupted flights across Europe. Otherwise, the increases are getting larger and larger as the months go by.

Some markets have recovered faster than others – while others have reacted very positively to the introduction of new routes, such as Spain, where arrivals are more than double last year’s. Only Germany saw an overall decline (-5.3%) but the other main markets saw increases, ranging from 33.8 per cent in Scandinavia to a more modest 6.7 per cent increase from the UK.

The total guest nights have improved since the first half of 2009 but as still not up to 2008 levels, as is the case with total expenditure.

18 new routes were introduced in 2010.