Nepal tourist arrivals up in February this year
Kathmandu, March 1: The arrival of international visitors to Nepal has increased in February as well.
“The upward trend which is already seen in January 2012 continues in the second month of the year 2012 showing clearly the rising travel demand towards the destination. Nepal has enjoyed a sustained positive growth in the international visitor arrivals since June 2009.”, says a press release of NTB.
The figures released by Immigration Office, Tribhuvan International Airport (TIA) reveal that visitor arrivals in the month of February 2012, compared to the same month last year, have increased by 13.7% to 42,716.
All regions have shown positive growth in the second month of 2012. India which constitutes the major market of Nepal, has recorded positive growth of 28.8 %. However, the arrivals from Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Pakistan have declined by 12.4%, 16% and 23.8%respectively. In aggregate the South Asian segment has registered a positive growth of 20.4%.
Arrivals from Asia (other than South Asia) have also recorded positive growth of 4.3% in aggregate with mixed performance from the individual countries. The visitor arrivals from Japan, Malaysia, South Korea and Thailand have increased by 33.2%, 19.8% 31.5% and 7.9% respectively. However the arrivals from China and Singapore declined by 23.1% and 25.3 % respectively.
An overall positive growth of 17.5% has been observed from the European markets with arrivals from major generating markets such as the UK, France, Germany, Italy Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and Russia up by 9.8%, 8.8%, 3.0%, 31.2%, 87.9%,42.4%, 34.3%, 35% and 6.8% respectively. However, the arrivals from the Netherlands and Norway have declined by 20.1% and 6.7% % respectively compared to the same month last year.
Tourist arrivals from Australia and USA have increased by 18.5% and 10.4% respectively whereas the arrivals from Canada and New Zealand saw negative growth of 5.2% and 34.2% respectively.
In January-February period of 2012, international tourist arrivals to Nepal have risen by 20.2% to 84,747.
A total of 46,499 foreign tourists departed from TIA in February 2012. The number of Nepalese arrivals stood at 61,409 while 67,238 Nepalese departed from TIA in February 2012.
