A 40 percent increase has been recorded in the number of tourists that visited the Maldives between March 1 to 25.
Statistics released by the Tourism Ministry show 59,588 tourists have visited the Maldives during the period. The number of tourists that visited the Maldives since the beginning of the year is currently at 83,667. This is a 40% increase in comparison to the previous year, and a 37.4 percent increase compared to the year before that.
While the Maldives closed its borders last year in response to the COVID-19 pandemic for a duration of three months, this is the first time the number of arrivals have passed the figures from the previous year since then. The average daily number of arrivals is currently at 3,246. The most number of daily arrivals recorded thus far this year was on March 26, with 5,275 arrivals. Tourists stay in the Maldives for an average of 8.9 days.
The initial assessment conducted by the government upon border reopening estimated that 800,000 tourists would visit the Maldives in 2020. However, the number fell short of the expected figures, and 555,494 tourists visited the Maldives that year. This is in comparison to the 1.7 million tourists the Maldives hosted the previous year.
The Maldives hopes to host 1.5 million tourists this year.
