ZANZIBAR, Aug 26 (NNN-DAILYNEWS) — ZANZIBAR has received a total of 68,223 foreign tourists in July this year, marking a 32.2 per cent increase compared to the 51,559 tourists who visited the islands in June.
The number of tourists recorded last month is also higher by 15.2 per cent compared to the number of visitors in the same month last year (2023), which was 58,711 foreign tourists.
The statistics have been released by the Office of the Chief Government Statistician (OCGS-Zanzibar) in collaboration with Zanzibar Tourism Commission during the monthly media briefing held this week at the OCGS building at Mazizini in Zanzibar City.
Presenting the statistics to journalists here, Hassan Ameir Vuai, Head of the Statistics Division at the Zanzibar Tourism Commission, said that Europe still leads in bringing in more tourists with 45,293, equivalent to 66.4 per cent of all tourists recorded in July this year.
He said that the African continent followed, bringing in 8,638 tourists (12.7 per cent), while the Asian continent ranked third with 8,022 tourists, accounting for 11.2 per cent of the total.
Tourists from the Oceania region in July this year were 731, equivalent to 1.1 per cent.
Oceania ‘continent’ include Australia, Papua New Guinea, New Zealand, Fiji, the Solomon Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Vanuatu, Samoa, Kiribati, Tonga, the Marshall Islands, Palau, Tuvalu and Nauru.
Italy led by bringing in 7,703 tourists (11.3 per cent) followed by France 5,442 tourists (8.0 per cent), UK 5,090 (7.5 per cent), Germany 4,587 (6.7 per cent) and Poland 4,519 (6.6 per cent).
On her part, Senior Economist and Lecturer at the School of Business of the State University of Zanzibar (SUZA), Dr Stella Ngoma, was of the opinion that the Tourism Commission should find other methods, including organising concerts that will attract more tourists.
She said that the level of foreign arrivals is still low, as Zanzibar still has untapped tourism attractions, “So there is a need to be creative to achieve the goal of increasing the number of foreign tourists to boost economic growth.”
Commenting about tourists’ arrivals, senior officer from Bank of Tanzania (BoT), Shamy Chamicha, suggested that research be done in the country to identify the type of attractions that tourists like most in order to improve. — NNN-DAILYNEWS
