Tourism in the Republic of Moldova is increasingly recovering from the pandemic. This year, the evolution is exclusively due to domestic tourism and guesthouses. Veaceslav Ioniță, an expert in economic policies at the Institute for Development and Social Initiatives (IDIS) “Viitorul”, said during the Friday, December 16, edition of the show “Analize economice cu Veaceslav Ioniță“, that officially, in 2022, the Republic of Moldova recorded more than 424 thousand tourists, of which almost 103 thousand promoted domestic tourism, which is 50% more than the record set in 2020.
Veaceslav Ioniță is confident that this year the number of tourists will exceed 450 thousand because after the pandemic it has become a habit among Moldovans to rest at home. At the same time, Moldovans rested in record numbers in Ukraine, and this year because of the war they could not go there. “In the third quarter, we had fairly strong growth, practically the highest until the pandemic. In the IV semester, we will manage to recover and we will finish the year, most likely, at the level of 2019, until the pandemic. The year 2022 is the year of total recovery of everything that the tourism branch means in the Republic of Moldova, and not at the expense of foreign tourists, but of those from the Republic of Moldova”, said Veaceslav Ioniță.
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The expert recalled that according to surveys carried out by IDIS “Viitorul”, three out of four Moldovans, when they decide to go on vacation, usually do not use a travel agency, but go on their own. And 1 out of 4 turns to a travel agency. As for foreign tourists, according to the expert, in 2022, the Republic of Moldova registered, until now, 29 thousand people who visited the country through travel agencies. At the same time, in Moldovan hotels, the number of foreigners resting is five times higher.
According to the economic analyst, guesthouses play an important role in the development of domestic tourism. This year, out of the 34 thousand tourists who stayed in guesthouses, 26 thousand are Moldovans. “In the third quarter, we had almost 10 thousand Moldovans who rested in guesthouses, which is 2 times more than the maximums that have been until now. Basically, this year we have had unprecedented growth. We had an increase in 2020, which was driven by the pandemic when people could not go abroad and rested at home. Now, I suppose the war influenced that. If we look at foreigners, this year we have already reached the record. In 2018-2019 we had about 6 thousand foreigners resting in the Republic of Moldova and this year we have already passed 7300 and I think we will reach 8500 by the end of the year, which will mean a 40% increase compared to the maximum which was until the pandemic”, emphasized Veaceslav Ioniță.
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Moreover, the economist emphasized that this year’s revenues in the tourism industry are over 750 million dollars, of which 650 million are money spent by Moldovans abroad and only 80 million – is money spent by foreign tourists in the Republic of Moldova. “For every dollar spent by a foreign tourist in Moldova, we spend somewhere around 8 dollars abroad. The tourism branch is probably one in which we could compete. But, unfortunately, the ratio is 1 to 8. We will spend about 18 million dollars in the country. The tourism branch is currently the branch that most actively takes money out of the country. We must teach foreigners to come to Moldova and we must teach Moldovans to rest more at home. We can certainly develop the tourism branch in a different way than we are at present!”, concluded the economist. More information is available HERE!