TRAVEL TRENDS:THE FIRST SIGNS of the slump in tourism that has led to the closure of dozens of hotels, tour operators and other travel-related businesses appeared in 2008, according to figures released by the Central Statistics Office yesterday.
Tourism Trends 2008shows there were 173,000 fewer overseas visits to the Republic last year compared with a year earlier. The figure fell from just over eight million in 2007 to 7.8 million in 2008. Earnings from visitors to Ireland also slipped by €120 million, to €4.8 billion.
The slide followed years of growth: between 2004 and 2007 the number of trips to the Republic by overseas visitors had increased by 22 per cent.
Today’s report also shows a drop in the number of visits from Britain, the Republic’s biggest tourist market, since a peak of almost 4.1 million in 2006. Last year’s figure was 3.9 million, almost 5 per cent lower than two years earlier.
Although residents of the Republic travelled abroad more in 2008 than they did in 2007, making just over eight million trips compared with 7.8 million a year earlier, that annual growth, at less than 3 per cent, was much lower than it had been since 2004, when we took only 5.5 million overseas trips. We spent €7.6 billion on foreign travel last year, an increase of nearly 11 per cent from 2007.
Spain accounted for almost a third of all trips abroad, making it the most popular holiday destination for travellers from the Republic in 2008, followed by Britain, France and the US.
Domestic holidays increased by 19 per cent between 2004 and 2008, and water sports and hiking doubled in popularity. Hiking also doubled in popularity among overseas visitors.
A CSO report last week suggested that the downward trend in tourism has continued in 2009. Overseas visits fell by 13 per cent in August this year compared with August 2008, and residents of the Republic took almost 11.5 per cent fewer foreign trips.