Maldives tourism boosted by rise in Chinese arrivals

Maldives tourist arrivals in February grew a moderate 6 percent when compared with the same period last year helped largely by increased arrivals from China, the Maldives Monetary Authority (MMA) said in its latest report. According to the MMA, "the annual increase was due to the rise in the number of arrivals from Asia and Europe," the MMA's monthly report noted. The MMA had previously revealed that tourist arrivals rose 17 percent in 2013 compared to the previous year "mainly due to the large increase in tourist arrivals from China, coupled with a slight growth in arrivals from Europe." Statistics from the Tourism Ministry show that 331,719 Chinese tourists visited the Maldives last year, which was a 44.5 percent increase from the previous year. Chinese tourists accounted for 29.5 percent of all tourist arrivals in 2013. In November 2013, the Finance Ministry revealed that the tourism industry's GDP growth in 2012 declined by 0.1 percent following 15.8 percent growth in 2010 and 9.2 percent in 2011. Despite negative growth in 2012, the Finance Ministry estimated that the industry would have expanded 5.5 percent in 2013 and forecast a growth rate of 5.2 percent for this year. The average duration of stay has however fallen from 8.6 days in 2009 to 6.7 days in 2012, and 6.3 days in 2013. According to the annual tourism yearbook published by the Tourism Ministry, the average occupancy rate of all tourist establishments in 2012 was 2.5 percent below the previous year at 70.6 percent. The Maldivian economy is largely dependent on tourism, which accounted for 28 percent of gross domestic product on average in the past five years, and generated 38 percent of government revenue in 2012.