Sunday records highest tourist arrivals since reopening

Over 6,000 tourist arrivals were recorded on Sunday, the highest single-day count since borders were reopened on July 15.

As many other nations, Maldives was forced to close borders to control the spread of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic. The country’s border were shutdown for nearly four months, from March 27.

While arrivals were lower than anticipated initially, it has been increasing each passing month and arrivals in December is nearly twice that of the previous month.

Tourism Minister Dr. Abdulla Mausoom on Sunday nighttweetedthat there were over 6,000 arrivals that day, adding that this is a new record of tourists arrivals in a single-day.

He proceeded to congratulate and thank industry partners, related authorities, the Maldivian people as well as those holidaying in the country.

The island nation has welcomed over 525,000 visitors this year, by the end of last week, out of of which about 145,000 arrived after border reopening. 87 foreigners were allowed entry into the country under special permission, during border closure.

While Maldives saw a record breaking 1.7 million tourist arrivals in 2019, a two million target was made for this year. However, this all changed following Covid-19 which left the tourism industry on a standstill. A new target of 500,000 was made for the year, which was reached ahead of projections on December 17. The new target is 545,000 visitors.

Further, a 1.5 million target has been made for 2021.