A total of 27,790.5 thousand travelers visited Greece from January to September 2023, with travel receipts jumping 15.2% to Euro 17.919 billion.

 

According to the Bank of Greece, the number of inbound travelers rose by 17.3% in the nine-month period compared to 23,686.7 thousand in the same period last year.

 

The balance of travel services showed a surplus of Euro 16.071.0 billion, up from a surplus of Euro 14.136.5 billion in the same period of 2022.

 

More specifically, travel receipts rose by Euro 2.359.7 billion, or 15.2%, to Euro 17.919.5 billion, while travel payments increased by Euro 425.2 million, or 29.9%, to Euro 1.848.5 billion. The rise in travel receipts was attributed to a 17.3% increase in inbound traveler flows, as average expenditure per trip fell by 2.5%.

 

German tourists in Greece up 6.5%

 

Receipts from Germany grew by 4.4% to Euro 2.965.7 billion, while receipts from France grew by 10.6% to Euro 1.290.7 billion. Turning to non-EU 27 countries, receipts from the United Kingdom rose by 6.8% to Euro 3.014.7 billion. Receipts from the United States increased by 13.5% to Euro 1,115.7 billion, while receipts from Russia dropped by 23.8% to Euro 28.0 million.

 

Traveler flows through airports grew by 11.7%, while traveler flows through road border-crossing points increased by 36.7%. In the period under review, the number of travelers from within the EU27 rose by 15.0% year-on-year to 16,946.9 thousand and travelers from outside the EU27 increased by 21.2% to 10,843.6 thousand.

 

The number of travelers from within the euro area rose by 10.0% and travelers from non-euro area EU27 countries increased by 25.2%. Specifically, the number of travelers from Germany grew by 6.5% to 3,855.5 thousand, as did the number of travelers from France, by 5.3% to 1,626.8 thousand.

 

Regarding non-EU27 countries, the number of travelers from the United Kingdom rose by 0.8% to 3,882.4 thousand and travelers from the United States increased by 32.6% to 1,108.0 thousand. On the contrary, the number of travelers from Russia fell by 3.8% to 30.1 thousand.

 

Tourism Minister Olga Kefalogianni

 

Tourism Minister Olga Kefalogianni, addressing the members of the Greek Marinas Association, outlined the immediate plans to strengthen and upgrade maritime tourism, in order to make the most of its potential.

 

Kefalogianni referred to the main interventions promoted by the ministry for tourist ports and financed by the Recovery and Resilience Fund, focusing on:

 

the energy/green infrastructure upgrade

 

improving the accessibility of facilities and

 

the digitization of tourist port services

 

As the minister emphasized, “with the implementation of this project, we aim to upgrade the quality of marine tourism services, to meet the increased demand for yachting tourism in Greece which will improve the competitiveness of the product, promoting our country to even higher levels internationally.”

 

Kefalogianni announced a new legislative framework for the simplification of tourist port licensing procedures aiming at flourishing investment activity, with priority given to respect for the natural environment.

 

The protection of the marine and coastal areas by ensuring the sustainability and viability of the tourism activity is a strategic goal of the ministry, she underlined.