Sri Lanka earned more than $1,129 million from tourist arrivals in the first eleven months of this year, the cash-strapped country’s central bank has said, an impressive increase due to the resumption of international flights and the easing of coronavirus-related restrictions. The boom has come.
The tourism sector is the main source of foreign exchange earnings in the country.
However, the onset of the pandemic in 2020 severely crippled the sector, and is one of the major causes of Sri Lanka’s economic crisis.
Sri Lanka welcomed 59,759 tourists to the country in November, an impressive 42 per cent increase from the previous month, the Central Bank of Sri Lanka said in a statement on Sunday.
As a result, the island nation’s earnings from international tourist arrivals for November reached $107.5 billion, with the cumulative tally for the first ten months of the year reaching $1129.4 million.
In October this year, the country earned $75.6 million through tourism.
The report said that a total of 6,28,017 tourists visited the country in the first eleven months of the year.
November had a daily average of 1,991 tourist arrivals, a significant jump compared to October, which saw 1,355 tourists.
The resumption of several international flights to the island nation has led to a strong increase in tourist arrivals.
Last month, Sri Lanka also saw nearly 4,000 tourists arriving by sea, the first time since the outbreak of the pandemic.
According to the Daily Mirror Sri Lanka newspaper, on November 18, the luxury cruise ship Viking Mars arrived in Colombo port carrying 900 tourists.
The report said that earlier this week the super luxury cruise ship Mean Schiff 5 arrived in Sri Lanka with around 3,000 passengers.
The Mirror reported that Russians accounted for nearly 23 per cent of the total tourist arrivals in November, followed by Indians at 17 per cent.
Meanwhile, the Sri Lankan government introduced a mobile app last week with the aim of improving security for international tourists.
According to news portal newsfirst.lk, Tourism Minister Harin Fernando has said that tourists will get the facility to check their location through this app.
Sri Lanka has been battling unprecedented economic turmoil since its independence from Britain in 1948.
The economic crisis has also created political unrest in the country.
Sri Lanka has been witnessing street protests since early April against the government’s handling of the economic crisis.
In September, the IMF announced a $2.9 billion bailout package to help the country recover from its worst economic crisis.
A severe shortage of foreign reserves has led to long queues for fuel, cooking gas and other essentials, while power cuts and rising food prices have heaped misery on the people.
