Just over 9,000 cruise passengers came to Malta in January.

The National Statistics Office said there were four cruise liner calls, with an average of 2,266 passengers per vessel.

Total cruise passenger traffic amounted to 9,062, a decrease of 28 per cent over the same month last year. Passengers from EU countries accounted for 71.2 per cent of the total traffic, with the main market being Germany. There was a decrease of 81.9 per cent in Spanish passengers and another 79.3 per cent from the United Kingdom.

Visitors from non-EU markets totalled 2,607, and comprised 28.8 per cent of the total traffic. Passengers from the United States accounted for 61 per cent of non-EU countries, whereas passengers from Japan increased by 48.1 per cent over the corresponding month last year.

On a gender basis, female passengers stood at 4,565, representing half the total traffic. The largest proportion of passengers - 46.8 per cent - comprised persons aged between 60 and 79, followed by those within the 40-59 bracket, who accounted for 30.9 per cent of the total.

People aged 80 and over represented 2.3 per cent of total cruise passenger traffic.