Turkey - foreign visitor arrivals to hit 40 million

Approximately 39.6 million international travellers visited Turkey between January and October, a rise of 88 percent when compared to the same time last year.

 

However, according to the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the total number of tourists, including Turkish residents living overseas, surpassed 45 million.

Germans dominated the list of international visitors: during the first ten months of 2022, over 13 percent of all international tourists were German. During the same time in 2021, 2.75 million German tourists visited the country. As for 2020, this number hardly exceeded one million.

Russians came in at number two in the ranking. Despite the continuing conflict involving Russia and Ukraine, 4.63 million Russians visited Turkey between January and October, up from 4.4 million in 2021 and 1.9 million in 2020 respectively. On the other hand, the number of Ukrainian visitors dropped by over 70 percent.

During this time span, Turkey attracted 3,2 million Brits. 2.4 million Bulgarians rated fourth on the top five list, as a large number of Bulgarians have gone shopping in the border districts of Edirne and Krklareli. And, following a decision by Turkish officials in late July allowing Bulgarian guests to remain in the country visa-free for up to 3 months, the influx of Bulgarian tourists has increased even more.

Over two million Iranians visited Turkey, rising from 865,000 the previous year, according to ministry statistics.

Foreign visitor arrivals increased by 38.4 percent year-over-year to 4.8 million in October, with the annual rate of increase slowing from 55.8 percent in September.

International arrivals increased by 314 percent in May of this year, and by 226 and 145 percent in April and June accordingly.

Istanbul was the top international tourist attraction. During the period from January to October, the megalopolis received 13,4 million international tourists. Antalya, situated on the Mediterranean coast, contributed 30,8 percent, or 12.2 million persons, to the total number of international guests. Approximately three million international visitors also toured the province of Mula, which has a number of attractive beach towns.

This year, Turkey aims to attract 50 million visitors and earn $44 billion from the tourism sector.

 

Source: hurriyetdailynews.com