Record tourism revenue seen
Report estimates 2023 will bring in 21 billion euros, up from €18.17 bln in best-ever 2019
Tourism revenue could reach a record €21 billion in 2023, a National Bank of Greece report estimates.
The final amount will certainly smash the record €18.17 billion receipts of 2019, the final year before the Covid-19 pandemic. While tourism recovered strongly in 2022, after two lean years, revenue, at €17.63 billion, fell short of a new record.
A large part of this higher revenue is due to higher prices caused by inflation that are expected to make up for the slightly shorter duration of visitors’ vacations.
The report makes note of two new trends that could continue in coming years: first, the rise of new tourist destinations, less saturated with visitors, such as Mytilene, capital of the island of Lesvos, and Kavala, a city in mainland northern Greece; second, more intense competition from countries such as Turkey, which increased its share of the Mediterranean holiday market from 19% in 2019 to 22% in 2022, while Greece saw its share stay steady at 13%, and Albania, whose share is still in the low single digits but has increased 24% since 2019.
From March to May, that is, during the off-peak season, tourist arrivals were 10% higher than during the same period in 2022 and revenue up 19%. Visitors from the US accounted for a large part of the gains and their high spending (€1,000 compared to €599 for all visitors) boosted revenue. On the other hand, arrivals from the UK dropped 5% from 2022, as did average spending (€668 from €713).
A significant change was that the tourist period started early in 2023, and the big cities, mainly Athens, benefited. Sales of city hotels rose from 38% of the total in 2019 to 41% in early 2023, while the islands’ share dropped slightly, from 51% to 48%. Athens is no longer merely a transit stop on the way to the islands.
The report notes that while arrivals by air rose 12% year-on-year in June, those on Mykonos and Santorini dropped 7%; arrivals on Mytilene and in Kavala rose above 20%.
The July wildfire in Rhodes could result in a 1% drop in visitors, the report notes, adding that the southeastern Aegean island accounted for 16% of all visitors in 2022 and for 17% of guests at 4 and 5-star accommodation.
