Tourism industry making constant progress - de Marco

During the first three months of the year, occupancy levels in hotels increased by three percent as did average room rates and gross operating profits.

Moving the estimates for the Malta Tourism Authority, Parliamentary Secretary for Tourism Mario de Marco, said that for the first time, hotels were nearing the break-even ratio.

All things proved that during the last19 months - from November 2006 to date - the tourism industry was making constant progress.

Dr de Marco said that it was the government's intention to keep growth at one per cent more than the average European growth, which is of between three and four per cent. Growth for the first four months of the year stood at 15 per cent.

He said that the success was due to the hard work put in by the stake holders and the four-point strategy adopted by the authority: increasing the carrying capacity of airlines flying to Malta, intensifying marketing campaigns, increasing investment in the infrastructure and providing the tourist with a unique experience when visiting Malta.

Earlier he announced that the number of tourists to Malta last year reached 1,243,000, an increase of 119,275 or 10.9 per cent over 2006 and spent 3.3 per cent more bed nights. They spent €1.58 billion or 6 per cent more than the previous year.

There was also a record number of 488,000 tourists arriving on cruise liners, an increase of 80,000.

Dr de Marco said that the duration of the holiday was getting shorter because tourists were preferring 'do-it-yourself' holidays and package holidays were therefore on the decrease. In 2006, 66.8 per cent of holiday makers came on package tours while 33.2 per cent non-package. Last year, package holidays decreased to 54.9 per cent and non-package holidays rose to 45.1 per cent. This did not mean that the tour operator was no longer important.

Never before had there been such a return on investment: for every lira invested, tourists spent more than Lm35.

In the first four months of this year, the number of tourists was 316,581, an increase of 15 per cent. Bed-nights increased by 2.7 per cent.

Last May, 335,777 passengers passed through Malta's International Airport, an increase of 17.5 per cent on the same month last year.

At the end of 2006, the government introduced low-cost carriers. At the same time, it encouraged legacy airlines, like Air Malta, to continue expanding. In 2007, this resulted in an increase of 9.3 per cent in the scheduled seat capacity over the previous year. The low cost carriers carried 237,000 or 9.56 of the passengers to and from Malta. This did not have a negative effect on Air Malta, which was able and flexible enough to rise to the challenge and increased its passengers by 16,500 passengers or 45.8 percent. In May, it registered its highest increase of 40,000 passengers or 30 per cent over May last year. Air Malta showed that it could compete with low cost carriers and turn a challenge into an opportunity.

For 2007, the MTA shifted more of its promotional budget from tour operators to promote direct bookings. It also appointed MediaConsulta, a German firm to help MTA devise a pan-European campaign.

In the middle of last year, there was a slowdown in bookings and the government allocated more funds to the authority to carry out more marketing efforts. The marketing expense during 2007 was at a record high: €21.5m or 22 per cent more than the previous year. The estimated expense for 2008 is Lm8.7m.

The rest of Dr de Marco's speech, as well as the rest of the debate, will be carried tomorrow. The estimates were approved after a division.