Tourist arrivals up in first two months of 2020, down sharply in March

Tourist arrivals in Cyprus were up by 2% annually in the first two months of this year but recorded a sharp drop in March, due to the lockdown imposed to contain the COVID-19 pandemic, data released by the Statistical Service of Cyprus on Wednesday show.

In particular, during the period of January – February 2020, arrivals of travellers reached 464,433 compared to 421,767 in the corresponding period of 2019, recording an increase of 10.1%.

During the same period, an increase of 2% was also recorded in tourist arrivals and 15.1% in the return of residents of Cyprus, CyStat says.

The arrivals of travellers in March 2020 reached 107,081 compared to 297,614 in March 2019, recording a decrease of 64.0%. The Cypriot government imposed in mid March an entry ban on the island for several categories of persons, including tourists, in the context of measures to contain the pandemic.

The decrease recorded in March is mainly attributed to the drop in the arrivals of tourists (67.4%) as well as to the return of residents of Cyprus (57.5%).

For the period of January – March 2020, arrivals of travelLers reached 571,514 compared to 719,381 in the corresponding period of 2019, recording a decrease of 20.6%.

Departures of travellers fell by 63.2% in March 2020 compared to the corresponding month of the previous year and by 18.9% for the period of January – March 2020.

Source: In-Cyprus