Foreign tourist arrivals reach 40 mln in 10 months
ANKARA
Some 39.6 million foreign tourists visited Türkiye in the January-October period, which marks an 88 percent increase from the first 10 months of 2021.
The number of visitors, including Turkish citizens residing abroad, exceeded 45 million people, the Culture
and Tourism Ministry said on Nov. 21.
Germans topped the list of foreign tourist list. In the first 10 months of 2022, 5.3 million Germans visited the country, accounting for more than 13 percent of all foreign tourist arrivals. In the same period of 2021, 2.75 million German holidaymakers came to Türkiye. In the same period of 2020, this figure was a little over 1 million.
Russians ranked second on the list. Despite the ongoing war between Ukraine and Russia, 4.63 million Russians traveled to Türkiye in January-October, up from 4.4 million in the same period of 2021, and rising from 1.9 million in January-October 2020.
However, the number of Ukrainian tourists declined by more than 70 percent to 586,000.
Türkiye welcomed 3.2 million Britons during the same period. In the first 10 months of 2021, only 278,000 British holidaymakers visited Türkiye, whereas the corresponding figure was around 800,000 two years ago.
Bulgarians ranked fourth on the top five list at 2.4 million. Tens of thousands of Bulgarians have been visiting the border provinces of Edirne and Kırklareli, mainly for shopping purposes.
The inflow of visitors from neighboring Bulgaria accelerated after a decision by the Turkish government in late July that allows Bulgarian visitors to stay in the country for a maximum of 90 days on visa-free travel.
In the first 10 months of the year, more than 2 million Iranians visited Türkiye, up from 865,000 a year ago, data from the ministry also showed.
In October alone, foreign tourist arrivals rose by 38.4 percent year-on-year to 4.8 million, with the pace of annual
growth in foreign tourist visits easing from 55.8 percent in September.
In May this year, the increase in foreign tourist arrivals was 314 percent, and in April and June, it was 226 percent and 145 percent, respectively.
Istanbul was the most popular destination with foreign tourists. In the January-October period, Türkiye’s megacity welcomed 13.4 million foreign visitors. The share of Antalya, located on the Mediterranean coast, in foreign tourist arrivals was 30.8 percent or 12.2 million people.
Some 3 million foreign tourists visited the province of Muğla, which is home to several popular resort towns.
Türkiye targets to welcome 50 million tourists and generate $44 billion in tourism revenues this year.
