Highlights
Tourist arrivals
1. The number of tourist arrivals for the year 2019 decreased by 1.1% to attain 1,383,488 compared to 1,399,408 for the year 2018.
2. Tourist arrivals by air decreased by 1.6% from 1,359,688 in 2018 to 1,338,235 in 2019 while those arriving by sea increased by 13.9% from 39,720 to 45,253.
3. The performance of our main markets, which accounted for 68% of total tourist arrivals for the year 2019, is given in the table below:
|
Country
|
Tourist Arrivals
|
|
2018
|
2019
|
% change
|
|
France
|
285,371
|
302,038
|
+ 5.8
|
|
United Kingdom
|
151,913
|
141,520
|
- 6.8
|
|
Reunion Island
|
138,439
|
137,570
|
- 0.6
|
|
Germany
|
132,780
|
129,100
|
- 2.8
|
|
South Africa, Rep. of
|
128,097
|
118,556
|
- 7.4
|
|
India
|
85,765
|
75,673
|
- 11.8
|
|
People’s Rep. of China
|
65,736
|
42,740
|
- 35.0
|
|
Total main markets
|
988,101
|
947,197
|
- 4.1
|
|
All countries
|
1,399,408
|
1,383488
|
- 1.1
|
4. Among the main markets, only France recorded a positive growth (5.8%). All the other markets registered decreases ranging from -0.6% for Reunion Island to -35.0% for People's Republic of China.
5. In the absence of visibility on the impact of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), an optimistic forecast of tourist arrivals for the year 2020 would be around 1,385,000.
Tourism earnings
6. The Bank of Mauritius has revised the forecast of tourism earnings for the year 2020 downwards from Rs 65.0 billion to Rs 63.0 billion, representing a decrease of 0.2% compared to Rs 63.1 billion recorded in 2019.
