MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Number of tourists arriving in Argentina falls for eighth month running

151.000 tourists spent 184.5 million USD in May

In May, for the eighth month running the number of foreign tourists visiting Argentina has dropped, mainly because of the global crisis, the A/H1N1 virus flu pandemic and domestic inflation.

The fall of 15% compared to the same month a year ago means 151.000 foreigners arrived in Argentina during May, based on data collected by the international tourism poll from the Secretary of Tourism and the Statistics and Census Office.

Buenos Aires Ezeiza international airport is taken as the main reference since it is estimated that 50% of all for foreign tourists arriving in Argentina come by air.

However the two government offices caution that because of the prevention measures taken to combat the A/H1N1 virus flu, “the statistics operation was affected by a reduction in the number of polling days originally programmed; therefore some estimates do not exhibit the usual disaggregating”.

During the same month the number of resident tourists leaving the country totalled 112.924, which represents a fall of 5.2%, following a 16.8% expansion the previous month.

The smaller number of tourists visiting Argentina was also more frugal about their expenses, having totalled 185.4 million US dollars, a contraction of 24.6% compared to the same month a year ago.

Travelling Argentines tourists are estimated to have spent 160 million US dollars, down 29.4% from a year ago, which means a concentration of business trips and with a short stay overseas.

In practical terms this means, according to the Argentine reports, that the accumulated result of spending (tourists arriving and leaving) during May and the first five months of the year was positive: 25.4 million US dollars in May and 318 million USD since the beginning of 2009.

Similarly the number of tourists arriving against those departing leaves a surplus; 38.130 in May and 255.592 in the first five months.