SL unlikely to achieve 100,000 monthly target as ‘Omicron’ fears grow

Tourism Minister Prasanna Ranatunga yesterday said that Sri Lanka will not be able to meet its ambitious monthly target of 100,000 arrivals owing to the surge in global ‘Omicron’ fears.

“As of yesterday, we have recorded around 65,000 tourists, and it appears that our monthly target of 100,000 to 125,000 arrivals will not be accomplished. The maximum arrivals we could expect for the next five days is 10,000,” he told the Daily FT.

The Minister pointed out that the spike in COVID cases, particularly in top source markets in Western Europe and India, has slowed down the tourist arrivals, whilst the strict outbound travel restrictions imposed by China and Japan too had impacted the numbers. 

Sri Lanka attracted nearly 59,000 tourists during the first 22 days of January, a significant increase from the 1,682 arrivals recorded in January last year. Russia recorded the highest number of arrivals in January, followed by India, Ukraine, UK and Germany.

Minister Ranatunga said the pace of recovery remains slow and uneven across world regions due to varying degrees of mobility restrictions, vaccination rates and traveller confidence.

As per the World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) Panel of Experts survey conducted in January, most tourism professionals (61%) see better prospects for 2022. Of the total, 58% expect a rebound in 2022 – mostly during the third quarter, whilst 42% point to a potential rebound only in 2023. Meanwhile, 64% experts now expect international arrivals to return to 2019 levels only in 2024 or later. However, it is already up by 45% from the survey conducted in September.