MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Cruise tourism brings £ 4.2 million to Falklands’ economy

Most visitors interviewed said they were interested in returning for a Falklands’ land-based holiday

Cruise tourism brought almost £ 4.2 million (almost 7 million US dollars) revenue to the Falkland Islands in the 2008-09 season, according to the Friday release from the Falklands Islands Tourist Board.

The figure includes spend on tours, shopping, food and beverage, as well as over £1.3 million in the form of government taxes and levies.

Most of cruise visitors were from the US, 39% followed by Canada 10% and the United Kingdom, 8.6%. US tourists spent the most money per head, an average of £57.32 with visitors from the UK and other countries spending in the region of £39 per head.

To carry out the survey, 599 cruise and expedition vessel passengers were interviewed while they waited outside the Jetty Centre for their tenders to take them back to their vessel.

“What’s very promising”, said Jake Downing, General Manager of the Falkland Islands Tourist Board, “is that almost half of the 599 cruise passengers we surveyed expressed an interest in returning to the Falklands for a land-based holiday. This represents the potential for considerable economic benefit to the Falkland Islands, as land-based visitors spend on average £917 per head on the islands.”

Visitors from the UK were most likely to want to return for a land-based holiday, and the Tourist Board is now planning an annual program of marketing activity in the UK to capitalise on this.