Overseas arrivals to South Africa were up 16% for the first quarter, while total international arrivals were up by 19%. This is according to the latest arrivals stats release by Statistics SA on Monday.
South Africa’s key source markets all experienced growth in the first quarter with arrivals from the UK up 14%, US up by 17%, and Germany up 19%. Belgium also experienced growth of 20%.
For the first quarter, arrivals from China were up by 65% and arrivals from India were up by 17%. Arrivals from Brazil were down by 5%.
Arrivals from other African countries also showed significant growth, with SADC arrivals up 20% for the quarter. Arrivals from Lesotho were up 38% for the period.
The strong growth in arrivals for the first quarter follows a tourism slump last year, when overseas arrivals dipped 5% and total arrivals were down 7% compared to 2014.
Compared to the first quater in 2014,overseas arrivals in the first quarter of 2016 were up by 8% while total international arrivals were up by 12%.
Satsa CEO, David Frost says that while this is encouraging there should be more of an improvement. "This is in-line with the global average, but given that our exchange rate has depreciated 44% against the US dollar in this period, we should be looking at least double digit percentage growth year on year and closer to 20% than 10%."
