Foreign arrivals increase by 5 pct in Namibia

Namibia's tourism statistics reveals that foreign arrivals increased by 3 percent from 2014 to 2015.

The Tourist Statistics Report for 2015, which was launched recently, reveals that the tourism market for Namibia in 2015 was dominated by Angola, South Africa, Zambia, Germany, Britain, the United States, and France.

The report noted that regardless of the tourist origin, most tourists visited Namibia during the last quarter of the year, which accounted for 28.3 percent of all tourists traveling to Namibia.

In terms of total foreign arrivals to Namibia, Minister of Environment and Tourism Pohamba Shifeta said a new record number of 1,519,618 in 2015 was recorded, of which 1,387,773 were foreign tourists.

"This speaks volumes, and we hope the tourism industry will take heart to these figures and continue working together to grow tourism in the country," he added.

According to him, the foreign arrivals figures are used in the collation of the Tourism Satellite Account statistics which determine the real value and contribution of tourism to the National Gross Domestic Product.

Meanwhile, Shifeta said it is worth noting that the statistics also reveal a drop in arrivals from Angola in terms of the regional source markets as a result of adverse economic development in that source market, while a dent was recorded in arrivals from China due to periodic fluctuations caused by uncertainties in global economy and growing competition globally.

Shifeta said the information generated by these reports thus enables all stakeholders to plan in the interest of sustainable and competitive growth of the Namibian tourism sector. Endit