(TAN): Sri Lanka has recorded a massive decline in international tourist arrivals in March 2020 because of the coronavirus pandemic, with a 70.8% drop compared to the same period last year, reports said.
The South Asian country had reportedly stopped all passenger flights and ships entering the nation on March 18 in a bid to slow the spread of the virus. According to reports, Sri Lanka had till then received 71,370 international tourists, compared to 2,44,328 foreign tourist arrivals in March 2019.
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The monthly data also showed India accounted for the largest number of international arrivals, followed by visitors from Russia, the United Kingdom, Germany and France, reports said. India reportedly contributed 17.7% of all arrivals, while visitors from Russia and United Kingdom made up 12.4% and 11.2% respectively.
While 34% of the overseas tourists came from the Asia Pacific region, the Americas accounted for 4.6%, Middle East 0.9% and Africa sent 0.5% of the arrivals, as per reports. Europe, with 60% arrivals, reportedly made up the largest portion of the tourist traffic.
Meanwhile, though all the regions posted a huge slump in arrivals, traffic from Kazakhstan went up 79.7%, reports said.
China reportedly made it to the top ten countries for tourist arrivals despite Wuhan in China’s Hubei province being the epicentre of the outbreak.
Arrivals in Sri Lanka also went down in the January-March quarter, as the travel industry received a huge blow from the outbreak, as per reports. For the quarter, arrivals dropped 31.5% to 507,311, reports said.
According to Johns Hopkins University, 665 cases of infection including seven deaths were reported in Sri Lanka.
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