Tourist nights hike 96.5% YoY in January 2018

CAIRO – 24 March 2018: Tourist nights increased 96.5 percent year-on-year in January 2018, reaching 8.5 million, compared to 4.3 million in January 2017, a report from the state statistics agency CAPMAS said.

The Middle East occupied the largest portion of the nights, with 29.3 percent, followed by Western Europe (27.9%), Eastern Europe (21.3%) and Africa (8.8%).

The report also showed that the number of departing tourists in January 2018 stood at 771,000, compared to 566,000 in January 2017, increasing by 36.2 percent.

The biggest portion of tourists was from Western Europe, with 30.7 percent, followed by Eastern Europe with 24.9 percent.

Tourism in Egypt has been picking up recently, with Tourism Minister Rania al-Mashat saying that the tourism sector is on the way to regain its boom, including is the increase of reservations in Egypt during the next season.

This came during her participation in ITB Berlin, the world's largest tourism trade fair, earlier this month.

Egypt’s tourism revenues jumped 123.5 percent year-on-year to $7.6 billion in 2017, a government official said in January.

The number of tourists who visited Egypt in that time jumped 54 percent to 8.3 million, he said.

Tourism is one of Egypt’s main foreign currency earners, but it has suffered several blows since the 25 January Revolution of 2011, including the downing of a Russian plane over Sinai in late 2015.

After the crash, Russia, which exports the largest number of tourists to Egypt, has banned all flights to Egypt.

However an agreement signed by Russian President Vladimir Putin in January approving the resumption of air traffic between Russia and Cairo, should see flights between both states resuming soon.

Flights between Cairo and Moscow are expected to be restored in April.