June tourist arrivals up 19 pc

Irangika RANGE

Tourist arrivals in Sri Lanka rose 19.9 percent to 53,636 in June 2011, from a year earlier, with strong growth in the Western European markets.

A Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority spokesman said that Sri Lanka has seen a resurgence in tourism after the end of the 30-year war in May 2009.

Tourists from Western Europe, the traditional tourist generating market, rose 1.5 percent to 14,087 in June 2011. The number of visitors from Finland went up from 87.5 percent to 90, France up 36.3 percent to 2,019 and from Sweden up 44.2 percent to 581.

He said during the first five months of 2011 tourist arrivals from Western Europe dominated with 129,367 arrivals, an increase of 37.1 percent compared to the same period last year.

Tourist arrivals in the country last June was only 44,730. Due to the government's tourism promotion drive, tourist arrivals has steadily increased since 2009.

Visitors from South Asia rose 22.1 percent to 18,431 with tourists from India were up, by 22.1 percent to 12,927, from the Maldives up 12.8 percent to 3,679 and from Pakistan up 41.8 percent to 1,337.

Arrivals from the Australia region went up 7.0 percent to 3,067 and from East Asia up by 32.2 percent to 6,836. Japanese visitors increased by 48.4 percent to 1,180, visitors from Malaysia rose by 7.5 percent to 1,335.

Visitors from Singapore rose 18.3 percent to 1,343.