Iceland promotes its summer sports tourism during World Cup

Thursday, June 14, 2018

Iceland, a small country with 350,000 populations is now boosting its tourism, as World Cup is knocking the doors.

For the locals, the team’s presence in Russia is still viewed as a golden opportunity to revive the tourism industry, now the country’s leading source of foreign exchange.

Skapti Orn Olafsson, a spokesman for the Icelandic Travel Industry Association said that Iceland is stepping on the big stage this summer.  The association is making the most of the World Cup, with its website inviting visitors to join President Gudni Th. Johannesson and the First Lady at #TeamIceland.

Helped in part by its location for popular films and television series like Game of Thrones, tourism has been one of the main drivers of Iceland’s recovery from the financial crisis of the past decade, surpassing the fishing industry as its main export. But there are now signs that the sector has lost momentum, with the central bank pointing to a reduction in flights to Reykjavik by several European airlines in its most recent financial stability report.

More importantly, the appreciation of the krona (it has strengthened by more than 40 percent against the euro since its 2009 nadir) has turned Iceland into the most expensive tourist destination in the world, dissuading potential visitors and prompting Landsbankinn, a leading bank, to declare that the tourism boom is over.

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