Figures going steady

Tourist & Passenger Movements for the period November 2006 to February/March 2007

Tourist Figures

Between November 2006 and February 2007, total tourist figures amounted to 220,301, an increase of 6.0% when compared to the same period a year ago. The main increase occurred during the month of December 2006, which registered an increase of 6,070 tourists or 15.0% when compared with December 2005. This increase was mainly reflected from a rise in holiday makers from Italy (+103.2%) and the UK (+23.8%).

Passenger Movements

Between November 2006 and March 2007, passenger movements increased by 8.7% reaching 746,037 passengers. During this period, total seat capacity amounted to 1,212,941 seats with a load factor of 61.5%. The month of March registered an increase of 9.6%.

The increase in tourist departures and passenger movements during the period under review was mainly attributable to the introduction of low-cost Ryanair to Malta with routes from Luton and Pisa as from the 31st October 2006 and Dublin as from the 8th February 2007.

Total Tourist Departures

	Nov	Dec	Jan	Feb	Total
year 2006/07	71,535	46,483	51,736	50,547	220,301
year 2005/06	69,652	40,413	50,524	47,301	207,890
percentage change	2.7%	15.0%	2.4%	6.9%	6.0%

Passenger Movements (both ways)

	Nov	Dec	Jan	Feb	Mar	Total
year 2006/07	167,285	143,844	127,024	131,608	176,037	746,037
year 2005/06	154,804	121,830	122,033	126,033	160,902	686,365
percentage change	8.1%	17.1%	4.3%	4.4%	9.6%	8.7%

stop press

Consolidated passenger movement figures for Q1 2007 show a healthy increase over the past few years.  In fact, 2007 Q1 passenger movements totalled 444,937.  The last year that Q1 passenger movements surpassed this figure was in 2001 (467,040), a year that was deemed to be especially good for the local tourism industry.