Tourists increased by 5.8 pc in January

Tourist arrival by air has increased by 5.8 percent in the month of January 2007 as compared to the same month last year.

Citing figures released by Immigration Office at the Tribhuvan International Airport on Wednesday, Nepal Tourism Board (NTB) press statement said, January's growth was contributed chiefly by Asian markets followed by growth from major European countries.
 
Although arrivals from SAARC declined by 8.2 percent including India (-4.8 percent), major growth came from Japan (41.6 percent) and South Korea (82.8 percent) in January.

NTB press release stated that increase in South Korean visitors was clearly a contribution by the operation of Korean Air since November last year while the increase in Japanese market signals growing confidence of travelers towards the destination.

The European segment improved by 11.2 percent with increases from key markets like France (13.6 percent), Germany (23.1 percent), Italy (33 percent) and Spain (35.4 percent) while UK arrivals didn't change much (-0.7 percent) while Dutch arrivals grew up (14 percent). Likewise, arrivals from Australia shot up by 118.6 percent while US arrivals gained 33.6 percent over the last January’s figure, NTB said.

On the other hand, the Chinese market came down by 40.2 percent along with Malaysia (-29.9 percent), Singapore (-47.3 percent) and Taiwan (-27.4 percent) but Thai tourists increased by 37.8 percent.