Sri Lanka December tourist arrivals up over 50 percent
Tuesday, January 15, 2008

The Sri Lanka Tourism Ministry said that December tourist arrivals to the country increased by 55.8 percent.

“Sri Lanka tourism which recovered after a year long slump since September 2006 out did its 20 percent growth in November 2007, with a 55.8 percent increase in December,” the Ministry said.

Arrivals that had decreased by 40 percent in May of last year, had picked up by year end, to finish the year with 494,008 arrivals narrowing the drop to 11.7 percent.

“January looked promising with the visiting Bohra Spiritual Leader and accompanying devotees filling up city hotel rooms at premium prices. The overflow of visitor demand in the city was also taken by Negombo, Wadduwa and Kalutara Hotels,” it said.

Tourism Minister, Milinda Moragoda hoped that 2008 as the year of consolidation. “Much effort will be laid on improving the quality of the tourism products while focusing on key markets such as India, Middle East, China and Russia that have shown a growth potential. Much will be done also to consolidate the conventional markets from Western Europe,” he said.

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Posted by Co-op Travel 4:58 AM 0 comments    

Sri Lanka Nightlife
Tuesday, July 24, 2007

Sri Lanka is the location in South Asia with the most active night life. One stretch of Galle Road in Colombo has so many casinos that it resmebles Las Vegas.

Gambling is illegal some South Asian countries and Casinos are unheard of. Sri Lanka on the other hand has her fair share even though they are not allowed to call themselves Casinos. So they call themselves clubs but under the hood they are fully fledged casinos that never sleep.

Discos and 'real' night clubs are a plenty. Until recently most of the activity was at the five star hotels. But lots of watering holes, pool palours and bowling alleys have sprung up all over Colombo in recent years. So hang around till the sun comes up.

Last but not least, alcohol flows very very freely in Sri Lanka. While the sorrounding countries are mostly dry, Sri Lanka has probably the largest per capita consumption of alcohol in the whole of Asia. This is despite ban on it's sale on Full Moon days (A religious holiday). So you better stock up on the day before.

Posted by Co-op Travel 6:47 AM 0 comments    

Sri Lanka Tourism to Score with Lankan Cricket
Monday, April 30, 2007

Sri Lanka Tourism had played a major role in forming a Sri Lankan cheering squad in the Caribbean.

Tourist Board Chairman Renton de Alwis said yesterday that this has been carried out with the assistance of Sri Lankan High Commissioner in Washington.

Accordingly match tickets of 30 Sri Lankan students in the US who have currently travelled to Caribbean has been upgraded with the assistance of Tourist Board. “These students who were already in the West Indies were scattered all over in the stadium during matches but we have been able to get them in to one stand and thus created a cheering squad,” he added.

In addition various other items such as masks of Sri Lankan cricketers have been couriered to Caribbean to be used by the Sri Lankan fans. The lion which a lady had at the semi final match is one of those items sent according to him.

“The placards carry various slogans all centered around our promotional theme 'Sri Lanka, a land like no other,” he said. For instance, a placard showing Lasith Malinga's bleached-blond hairdo with the legend “a lad like no other” is being placed next to Sri Lankan masks, de Alwis said.

“Power of positive thinking is an effective thing,” he added.

Sri Lanka is using the cricket World Cup to lure holidaymakers as tourist arrivals have dipped by 16% in the first quarter this year.

“The exposure we have had during the World Cup is simply priceless for the country's image. The team's success has generated enormous awareness about the country. It's a shot in the arm for us,” de Alwis said.

An AFP report said Sri Lanka's image as a tourist destination has taken a beating since fighting between government troops and Tamil Tiger rebels surged in December 2005.In the three months to March this year, some 134,600 foreign tourists visited the island, a 15.6 percent drop over the same period in 2006, according to official figures.

March was the worst, with authorities reporting just 35,031 visitors, a 36.0 percent drop over the same month a year earlier.

“Hopefully, our cheer squads and creative visual material will attract more cricket fans to Sri Lanka when England tours the island in October,” de Alwis said.

Sri Lanka Tourism has rolled out a 500-million rupee (4.6-million dollar) campaign to promote Sri Lanka in India, Europe and China this year.

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Sri Lanka Must Have Hotel Accommodations to Cater the Distinct Needs of the Saudi Muslim Tourists
Tuesday, April 17, 2007

17 April 2007

Sri Lanka can increase present percentage of Saudi tourists, if it provides suitable locations which protect customs and practices of Saudis culture. Commercial Division of the Embassy of Sri Lanka in Riyadh, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia said about 75 percent of Saudis prefer to travel with their big families and to be in an isolated place with their family members. They like to stay in apartment type hotels and expect facilities like separated swimming pools.

The Commercial Division of the Embassy said therefore, it is necessary to encourage investors in the tourism sector to build apartment type hotels in order to attract tourists from Saudi Arabia and the Middle East. In addition building up of amusement parks and large shopping malls would be additional attractions to encourage more tourists from Saudi Arabia.

They further said a number of Saudis visit Eastern European countries for physiotherapy treatments. Sri Lankan spa owners and the travel promoters should create awareness campaigns among Saudis to attract more tourists.

Saudi Arabia is the eighth country in terms of number of tourists traveling aboard. Only 24 percent of Saudi tourists visit summer resorts in Saudi Arabia while 29 percent travel to other Arab countries and the 47 percent visit different destinations.

During every summer, Saudis visit other countries and their aggregate spending for foreign travel was over US$15 billion. In total about 70 percent Saudis visit foreign, countries as travelers.

During the period June to August in the year 2005 approximately 120,000 Saudis traveled overseas to spend their summer vacation.

“Their main destinations are Asian and European countries, the Embassy said.

During the year 2005 around 40,000 Saudis traveled to Malaysia and most of the rest spent their holidays in the EU countries such as France , UK, Switzerland , Italy, Austria and Germany. However only around 1400 Saudis visited Sri Lanka during year 2005.Most of them were in Sri Lanka to attend businesses and recruiting workers for their companies.

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England Cricket Team’s Sri Lanka Tour Details Released
Monday, April 2, 2007

30 March 2007

The dates for England cricket team’s tour of Sri Lanka this year have been released.

The One-Day International matches and the Test Series run between September and December, and the Sri Lankan Tourism board expects operators to start marketing packages around the tours.

The England team will arrive in Sri Lanka on September 25, and the One-Day International matches start on October 1.

The first Test Series match will take place between November 25 and 27, with the third and final one due between December 18 and 22.

Jean-Marc Flambert, Sri Lanka Tourism UK director, said: "In the past, we have attracted over 5,000 English cricket supporters to Sri Lanka as the games are being played in places of historical and cultural significance."

Host cities include Dambulla, Colombo, Moratuwa, Colts CC, Kandy and Galle.

One-Day Internationals

Sept 25: Arrival of England team
Sept 28: Warm-up match
Oct 1: First ODI (Dambulla)
Oct 2: rain reserve day
Oct 4: Second ODI (Dambulla)
Oct 5: rain reserve day
Oct 7: Third ODI (Dambulla)
Oct 8: rain reserve day
Oct 10: Fourth ODI (Colombo)
Oct 11: rain reserve day
Oct 13: Fifth ODI (Colombo)
Oct 14: rain reserve day


Test Series

Nov 15: Arrival of England team
Nov 20–22: Warm-up match (Moratuwa)
Nov 25–27: First-class match (Colts CC)
Dec 1–5: First Test (Galle)
Dec 9–13: Second Test (Colombo)
Dec 18–22: Third Test (Kandy)

Posted by Co-op Travel 4:14 AM 0 comments    

Sri Lanka Records Growth in Tourism but Far Behind Targets
Thursday, January 18, 2007

Sri Lanka Tourist Board figures show that the arrival of tourists to Sri Lanka increased last year despite the country's escalating ethnic conflict. However, the tourist arrivals were far behind the targeted 600,000.

Some 549,308 tourists arrived in Sri Lanka in 2006. This is 10,295 more than the number of arrivals in 2005, said the Sri Lanka Tourist Board.

Tourist arrivals from India increased, while the high-spending Western European tourists declined in number over the past year.

Series of promotions launched by the Sri Lanka Tourist Board and the availability of a direct Sri Lankan Airlines flight attracted more Chinese tourists.

Sri Lanka Tourist Board together with the World Tourism Organization is organizing a Regional Workshop on Tourism Statistics and Tourism Satellite Account in Colombo, Sri Lanka, from 13-16 February 2007 especially for statistics professionals and managerial staff in tourism industry.

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Tourism:Hoping for Summer After Bleak Winter
Tuesday, January 9, 2007

The New Year brings good and bad news for the tourism industry as the Government renews efforts to promote Sri Lanka as a travel destination but hoteliers continue to suffer with falling occupancy rates.

As the travel advisories issued by many European countries seem to stand firm, only Britain has shown relative leniency on travel to Sri Lanka.

‘First Choice’, one of the largest outbound tour operators in the UK is scheduled to restart its charter flights to Sri Lanka next month after suspending flights in November 2006. However, if the tour operator does not have an acceptable load factor (number of passengers) it runs the risk of reconsidering these charter flights.

According to the Tourist Hotels Association of Sri Lanka (THASL) this situation can be very advantageous to the tourism industry at the present time since the charter flights would give credibility to Sri Lanka as a destination and the operator would push to fill all seats generating volume-business.

However not everything is going smoothly for tourism in Sri Lanka as hoteliers still fight for concessions from the Government and there is no improvement in occupancy rates. The THASL has requested the Tourism Ministry for a moratorium on loans taken by hotels, which according to many hoteliers is directly targeting the hotels affected by the tsunami.

THASL has also asked for a temporary exemption from VAT payments for a stipulated period of time to enable hotels to recover from the poor turnover during the peak season. Apart from low occupancy rates, the new electricity tariff which came into force has also victimized the tourism industry.

Although the new tariff has given some relief to industries, the Government has failed to recognize hotels as one that falls into the industrial category thus excluding the hotel industry from the benefits of the new tariff. The hotel industry is widely considered a ‘thrust industry’ and almost 100% of local raw materials are converted into services and products resulting in large turnovers which are predominantly in foreign exchange.

The hotel industry is also the fourth largest foreign exchange earner for the country making hoteliers feel unappreciated by the Government’s failure to recognize them as an industry. Meanwhile, the Government’s effort to put tourism back on its feet has not been completely unsuccessful. Plans have been made in consultation with the Tourism Ministry and the national airline regarding a direct consumer campaign in Britain which is scheduled to be launched in early 2007 while another one is being finalized for China and the Middle East.

This will be a partnership with a select number of UK tour operators on 50% cost sharing basis. The Ministry and the Tourist Board has assured that the funds for this campaign will be forthcoming from the Government.

Sri Lanka is also preparing to participate in the ITB tourism fair in Berlin with the Tourist Board and the Tourism Ministry making their best efforts to have 50% of the stall charges waived for participating companies.However the current political and military situation in the country sets up the tourism industry for another roller coaster ride of ups and downs during the year.

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