Tourism Flows to Greece Robust for August

Photo © Maria Theofanopoulou

Tourism traffic to Greece continued its dynamic into August, with Greek destinations welcoming more than 6 million travelers, and over 21 million in the first eight months of the year, according to provisional data released by the Bank of Greece.

The travel surplus for the same month came to 3,436 million euros compared to 3,388 million euros in August 2017.

Photo by GTP

Travel receipts for August grew by 1.4 percent year-on year to 3,604 million euros against 3,553 million euros in the same month boosted by a 4.8 percent rise in incoming traffic. Average spending however dropped by 19 euros (3.2 percent).

For the overall January-August period, the travel account showed a surplus of 10,347 million euros compared to 9,312 million euros in the corresponding period of 2017 due in large part to an 11.1 percent increase in travel receipts to 11,764 million euros. The rise was driven by an 11.6 percent rise in tourism flows.

EU residents generated increased travel receipts by 14.4 percent to 8,175 million euros while revenue from travelers outside the Union dropped by 36.7 percent to 1,997 million euros.

In terms of markets for August, travel receipts from EU nationals grew by 2.2 percent to 2,605 million euros, while revenue from non-EU travelers decreased by 0.4 percent to 937 million euros against 941 million euros in August 2017.

Incoming traffic of August increased by 4.8 percent to 6,093,000 compared to the same month in 2017. Tourist flows through Greece’s airports increased by 10.7 percent driven by an 8.7 percent rise in EU visitors, while road traffic was down by 4.1 percent.

Over the eight months of 2018, inbound traffic grew by 11.6 percent to 21,088,000 travelers compared to 18,896,000 in the same period last year. Traffic through Greek airports grew by 14.1 percent, with road traffic up by 7.6 percent.