Cruise liner passengers down by half

Cruise liner passengers dropped by half last month, totalling 33,636 when compared to the 67,259 who visited in the same period last year.

The total cruise passenger traffic in Malta between January and June hit 135,515 people, marking a 32 per cent drop over the comparative period last year, the National Statistics Office said.

The number of cruise liner calls also dropped, by 39 per cent, from 155 in 2008 to 94 this year. There were 23 cruise liner calls in June.

This slump contrasts with the increase in passengers registered in the beginning of the year.

In January, the number of cruise passengers who visited Malta rose sharply over the previous two Januarys, reaching 12,580. That was up from just 2,193 in January last year and 1,398 in January 2007.

Cruise passenger traffic also saw a rise in February from just under 2,500 passengers in the same month last year to about 14,200 this year.

At the time, the figures were welcome in the tourism sector that was bracing itself for a bumpy ride in 2009 as the global financial crisis eats into the pockets of potential tourists.

According to the NSO's figures for the period covering January to June this year, passengers from EU countries accounted for 67 per cent of total traffic, the main markets being Germany, Italy and the UK. Significant drops were registered in the Spanish and Italian markets. On the other hand, passengers coming from non-EU countries rose by 6.4 per cent, notably the American market, the NSO said.

The average number of passengers per cruise liner, which is defined as the number of passengers divided by the number of liner calls, stood at 1,462 passengers for June.