According to the National Bank of Georgia, in the first half of 2018 Georgians spent 791,498,000 GEL abroad.
The tourism market is fast growing around the world as global revenues generated from tourism have even exceeded one trillion dollars. Over the past 20 years the amount of tourist arrivals has almost doubled.
Among countries around the world, the USA receives the highest revenues from tourism. Last year the USA generated 210 billion USD from tourism. Chinese nationals account for the largest expenditure on travel. According to the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), last year Chinese nationals spent 257.7 billion USD, marking an annual increase of 4.7%.
In second place are American citizens with 135 billion USD expenditure (an increase of 9.3%), and in third place is Germany with 89.1 billion USD expenditure (a 9.4%increase).
In the top five are also the United Kingdom – 71.4 billion USD (2.4% increase) and France 41.4 billion USD (0.8% increase).
Canadian citizens spent 31.8 billion USD on international travels last year, which is an annual increase of 8.5%.
In 7th place with 30.6 billion USD is South Korea (12.3% increase). In the top ten are: Italy ($27.7 billion USD), Australia (34.2 billion USD) and Russia ($31.1 billion USD). It is worth noting that the expenditure on travels by Russian citizens has increased by 29.7%.
With regards to Georgia, according to the World Tourism Organization, in 2016 Georgian travelers spent 0.3 billion USD, which is an increase of 17.2% compared to 2015.
According to the National Bank of Georgia, in the first half of 2018 Georgians spent 791,498,000 GEL abroad, which is 37.3% higher compared to the same period last year (496,781,000 GEL). The figure includes operations carried out by cash machines as well as transactions carried out both over the internet and with the point-of-sale terminals.
