Sri Lanka Tourism; after Russia, will it now be India?
Up until March 2022, one of the most predictable things we saw was the large numbers of Russian travelers visiting Sri Lanka. Infact, they have held the number one spot in the ‘Top 5 visitors by nationality” list since December 2021.
Alas, the war with Ukraine took its toll as the Russian arrivals decreased - dropping them from the number one spot to fifth in the list of Top 10 visitors in nationality.
And now, Sri Lanka’s biggest inbound market – India…is turning towards alternative destinations. The current Sri Lankan political turmoil threatens to cripple the tourism industry, which is worth more than $3.6 billion to the country and is the third largest foreign exchange earner.
Plagued by setbacks, even prior to the onset of COVID, such as the Easter Sunday bombings in 2019, the island’s tourism recovery had just begun – mainly due to the country’s decision, taken twelve months ago, to welcome tourists sans quarantine. This at a time when several countries around the world continued to keep borders closed and tourists away.
The results from opening the destination earlier than other countries bear testimony to that prudent decision. Sri Lanka welcomed over 100,000 international visitors in March 2022, bringing accumulated arrivals between January and March to more than 280,000. In other words total arrivals in the 1st quarter of 2022 exceeded the total 194,000 that arrived to Sri Lanka during the twelve months of 2021.
Now however, faced with what is said to be the worst economic crisis in the country, Sri Lanka has been witnessing a spate of anti-government protests against worsening shortages of food, fuel and medicines amidst record power outages.
Despite the tourism secretary’s assurance that the tourism ministry of Sri Lanka would ensure an uninterrupted supply of fuel and electricity to tourism establishments to enable the successful delivery of the holiday experiences expected by the tourists visiting Sri Lanka over the Easter period and beyond, the ground realities are sending jitters to Indian tour operators and visitors.
The signs appear ominous. According to a PTI report, Air India has cited poor demand as the reason for reducing its India-Sri Lanka services from 16 flights per week currently to 13 flights from April 9. One of the biggest travel trade associations in India - the Travel Agents Association of India (TAAI), is scheduled to host its 66th convention in Colombo from April 19-22.
Only last month, an event was held in Delhi to announce the convention with members from the Sri Lanka Association of Inbound Tour Operators (SLAITO) also in attendance. However, TAAI said that the convention is now in limbo because there isn’t much clarity on how things would move ahead following the current situation.
Despite been a favourite nation for Indians who find easy access and lots of diverse attractions a delight, the prospects of losing out looms high as the Indian traveler opt to reschedule their travel plans, with several of them switching instead for short-haul destinations like Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Maldives, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and Nepal.
Hospitality Sri Lanka
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