Tourist arrivals rose by 3.8 percent in the whole of last year but dropped by 12.4 percent in December, the NSO said today.

Arrivals increased between January and August but started dropping at an increasingly steeper gradient from September as economic conditions abroad worsened.

The NSO said 45,139 tourists came to Malta last month, from 51,532 in December 2007.

Arrivals in the whole of 2008 totalled 1,290,856, thanks to increases in arrivals from Italy (+27%), Germany (+16%) and Spain (+32%). There were decreases in arrivals from the UK, Malta’s biggest market, which saw a drop of 5.8% to a total of 454,356 tourists.

The numer of tourists opting for package tours decreased by 13 percent . The largest proportion of tourists (465,128) were aged between 25 and 44 but the biggest increase was in the 0-24 age group, which grew by 16 percent to 219,241 visitors.

Tourist expenditure was €1,041.2 million, a drop of 1.6 percent over the previous year. The per capita tourist spend was €819, down by 5.8 percent when compared to 2007.