Maldives tourist arrival count has surpassed the 247,000 mark.

By Thursday, a total of 247,138 tourists had arrived in the island nation, a popular holiday destination among zealous travelers.

This is 40.2 percent less than the number of tourists recorded for the same period last year, where 381,409 arrivals were recorded. The Ministry also shared that an average of 3,210 tourists were visiting the Maldives every day based on their statistics, with duration of stay recorded at an average of nine days.

So far in March, Maldives has welcomed 58,153 visitors and the highest daily arrivals were recorded on March 7 with 4,325 arrivals, whereas the lowest arrivals were recorded on March 10, with 2,368 arrivals.

On Sunday, 4,101 tourists arrived in the country, followed by 2,775 on Monday and 2874 on Tuesday.

While Wednesday saw 2,572 tourist arrivals, the number increased to 3,159 on Thursday.

Further, India remains the top source market for tourist arrivals thus far, while it was ranked second before the Covid-19 pandemic began sweeping across the globe. India is followed by Russia and third comes Ukraine, which rose from the 23rd rank according to pre-Covid stats.

A total of 682 tourist accommodation establishments are currently in operation with 45,527 beds across the Maldives.

Latest statistics publicized by the Ministry of Tourism indicate that of the 682 tourist facilities, 385 are guesthouses with 7,026 operational beds, 149 resorts with 34,344 beds, 137 liveaboard vessels with 2,699 beds and 11 hotels are also in operation with 1,458 beds.

The ministry revealed that guesthouses are in operation across 56 islands of 18 atolls, by Thursday’s end.

On Tuesday the ministry had signed a lease agreement with FEDO Private Limited to develop a 100-room hotel in the beach of Kelaa island in Haa Alif atoll.

The ministry boasts increasing tourist arrivals, which were snail-paced into the beginning of the country’s tourism-revival journey. As such, an optimistic tourism ministry revealed that the source markets are recovering, with “impressive” results.

With this being said, the average growth rates of arrivals from the Central/Eastern Europe and South Asia had surpassed the pre-Covid rates by March 10, with individual markets within the Central/Eastern European region excelling as new markets emerge from the region and making the top 10 source markets for Maldives tourism.

The country saw a record-breaking 1.7 million tourist arrivals during 2019 and an optimistic government set a vision to break the record with two million arrivals in 2020, which was foiled by the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, due to which authorities halted issuing on-arrival visas on March 27 that year.

Nearly four months later, Maldives tourism began reviving, albeit snail-paced at first, from July 15, arrivals began increasing steadily over the past couple of months. Maldives was able to exceed its new target of 545,000, by the end of December 2020 and aims to welcome 1.5 million tourist arrivals this ongoing year.

Maldives will mark 50 years since the tourism industry’s inception, in 2022, which is to be celebrated as the golden year of tourism in Maldives.