• Welcomes a total of 102,545 tourists for whole of January
• Narrowly misses 105,000 monthly tourist arrival target
• Russia, India and UK emerge as top three tourist traffic generators

The tourist arrivals to Sri Lanka crossed the 100,000 mark in January for the first time since March 2022. 
The data from the Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority (SLTDA) showed that for the January 01 to 31 period, a total of 102,545 international visitors entered the country. 

When compared with the corresponding month of the previous year, the tourist arrivals to the island nation grew by 24.5 percent. In January 2022, Sri Lanka welcomed 82,327 visitors. 

However, January missed the monthly arrivals target of 105,000 set by the Tourism Ministry. Sri Lanka aims to attract at least 1.5 million tourists by the end of the year. 

The average daily tourist arrivals for January stood at 3,307, an improvement from the 2,930 achieved in the previous month, December 2022. 

The inflow of tourist arrivals improved on a weekly basis as well. In the first week (01-07), the tourist arrivals were at 20,875, which improved to 23,297 in the second week, 24,796 in the third and 33,579 in the fourth week. 
The Russian Federation emerged as the largest tourist traffic generator for Sri Lanka tourism in January. It accounted for 25 percent of the total arrivals. 

Ranking as the second was India, accounting for 13 percent of the total traffic. The UK emerged as the third, contributing to 8 percent of the total arrivals. 

 Plans are afoot to carry out targeted tourism promotional campaigns in seven key tourism source markets for the year 2023. The markets shortlisted by the SLTDA for a promotional campaign are India, China, the Russian Federation, UK, Germany, the Middle East and Australia.

Sri Lanka is estimated to have earned US $ 1.13 billion from tourism in 2022, compared to US $ 507 million in 2021. The country welcomed 719,978 tourists in 2022, up from 194,495 in 2021.