Tourist arrivals top 1.2mn for 2013 after data validation

9 January 2014 03:45 am Views - 10511

Sri Lanka Tourism yesterday said it had topped the arrival target of 1.2 million tourists set for 2013, after it adopted a new method of calculation.

According to previous statistics put out by the Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority (SLTDA), up to November 2013, Sri Lanka had welcomed 1,016,228 million tourists, requiring another 200,000 in December to achieve the target, a number which had not been achieved in any month in 2013.

A media statement by the Sri Lanka Tourism Promotion Bureau however yesterday said Sri Lanka in total had received 1,274,593 tourists during the year 2013 after Sri Lanka Tourism had validated the tourism arrival figures for each month of 2013.

“The new validation was carried out based on the statistics provided by the computer data collection method of the Immigration and Emigration Department of Sri Lanka.

The new system is a joint effort of both the Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority and the Emigration and Immigration Department of Sri Lanka to ensure that the country accurately captures the tourist arrival figures,” the statement said.

It further said Sri Lanka Tourism follows the standards set by the UNWTO for defining a tourist when calculating the tourist arrivals figures, which says “a person who stays at least one night in a country and does not exceed his stay period for more than 12 months.”

“The newly established Electronic Data Capturing System is expected to help reduce the errors which take place when calculating the data manually. This system will come into full swing during the year 2014. Accordingly, Sri Lanka Tourism took steps to validate 2013 arrival data using the new system.”