Sri Lanka’s visitor arrivals rose by 6.2 percent in May

Wednesday, June 6, 2018

Visitor arrivals in Sri Lanka increased by nearly 6.2 percent in May as compared to the same month last year with more than 129,000 tourists visiting the island nation according to statistics from the Tourism Ministry that were revealed on Tuesday.

Germany, Australia, Britain, China and India were among the leading five markets generating the highest number of arrivals.

Almost 96.7 percent of tourists had travelled by air to Sri Lanka.

China was among the leading three markets and it had 17,103 tourists visiting Sri Lanka in May. This year Sri Lanka had already witnessed more than 115,870 Chinese visitor arrivals to the island nation.

Overall tourist arrivals this year has been over a million with the government targeting a 2.5 million tourist arrival by the end of the year.

In an attempt to lure more Chinese tourists John Amaratunga, the Tourism Minister mentioned last month that the government of Sri Lanka had signed an agreement with a leading Chinese tour operator.

Amaratunga said China is a significant destination for Sri Lankan tourism and the government hopes to attract over 300,000 Chinese tourists this year.

The minister said the government will target a revenue of 4.4 billion U.S. dollars through its tourism sector this year.

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