Partial recovery in tourism trips by EU residents in 2021
In 2021, residents of the 27 European Union member states made 879 million tourism trips with at least one overnight stay ( up 23 per cent compared with 2020; 713 million trips), EU statistics agency Eurostat said on December 20.
This was still below the pre-pandemic level of 1.1 billion tourism trips in 2019, Eurostat said.
Residents of three EU countries accounted for more than half of the trips made in 2021: France (200 million trips), Germany (178 million) and Spain (131 million).
The pandemic caused a shift towards domestic tourism.
In 2020 and 2021, Europeans spent around 85 per cent of all their tourism trips within their country of residence, against 73 per cent domestic trips in 2019.
In 2021, trips to other EU countries accounted for 12 per cent of all tourism trips (compared with 11 per cent in 2020 and 20 per cent in 2019).
On the other hand, the number of trips with a destination outside the EU represented only three per cent of all tourism trips (compared with three per cent in 2020 and eight per cent in 2019).
In terms of nights spent, on average, domestic trips tend to be shorter than trips abroad.
The share of domestic tourism nights in total nights spent in 2021 was 73 per cent, compared with 76 per cent in 2020 and 58 per cent in 2019).
Tourism statistics comprise trips for personal purposes as well as trips for professional purposes.
In 2021, business trips accounted for eight per cent of all reported trips, compared with nine per cent in 2020 and 11 per cent in 2019.
In 2021, the number of trips for personal purposes recovered to 80 per cent of the pre-pandemic level, Eurostat said.
However, the number of trips for professional purposes recovered much less, at 55 per cent of the pre-pandemic level, which may reveal a significant and more permanent shift to remote or hybrid business contacts, the statistics agency said.
(Photo: Lance Nelson of Bansko App)
Please support The Sofia Globe’s independent journalism by clicking on the orange button below. For as little as three euro a month or the equivalent in other currencies, you can support The Sofia Globe via patreon.com:
