Greece Tourist Arrivals Exceed 20 Million in Jan-Sep 2015

Photo © GTP

Greece saw an increase of 17.1 percent in visitor arrivals in the first nine months of the year.

According to Bank of Greece data released on Monday, over 20.6 million tourists came to Greece up to September compared to the same period last year.

Travel receipts showed a 4.7 percent increase year-on-year to 12,570 million euros. This development is attributed to higher receipts from citizens from countries within the EU28 (up 10.5 percent to 8,174 million euros), as receipts from outside the EU28 dropped by 4.8 percent to 4,084 million euros.

In particular, receipts from euro area residents increased by 6.7 percent to 5,208 million euros, while receipts from residents of non-euro area EU28 countries rose by 18 percent to 2,966 million euros. Specifically, receipts from Germany rose by 7.4 percent to 1,859 million euros and those from France by 3.1 percent to 1,069 million euros.

Receipts from the United Kingdom also increased by 25.2 percent to 1,749 million euros. Turning to non-EU28 countries, receipts from Russia fell by 69 percent to 342 million euros, while receipts from the United States increased by 38.4 percent to 804 million euros.

Accordingly, in January-September 2015, the balance of travel services showed a surplus of 11,074 million euros, up 5.8 percent from a surplus of 10,464 million euros in the same period of 2014.