According to the Ministry of Tourism, the number of tourist arrivals increased by an annual 10.86% to settle at 1.71M by November 2017. In fact, the number of tourists coming from the Arab countries, Europe, and the Americas pushed total tourist arrivals upward.
In details, European tourists who made up 34.33% of total tourists, climbed by 13.63% y-o-y to 588,706 travelers by Nov. 2017. In fact, the French and German visitors increased by an annual 17.25% and 13.98%, to 155,514 and 92,998 tourists, respectively. Travelers from the United Kingdom and Sweden also registered annual upticks of 13.91% and 15.27% to reach 64,669 and 36,945, respectively, by Nov. 2017.
In addition, the number of visitors from Arab countries, representing 30.55% of the total, rose by 9%, on a yearly basis, to 523,930. In fact, the number of Saudi and Kuwaiti tourists following the travel ban lift rose from 35,603 and 22,296 by Nov. 2016, to reach 61,189 and 38,937 by Nov. 2017. In contrast, the number of Iraqi, Egyptian, and Emirati tourists regressed by a yearly 2.66%, 0.54%, and 4.62% to 215,332 , 75,761 and 1,836 respectively. Meanwhile, the number of Jordanians rose by 6.05% to 84,520 by Nov. 2017.
As for American tourists who grasped a share of 17.6% of the total tourists, their number rose by an annual 11.11% to 301,604 by Nov. 2017. This rise is mainly attributed to the yearly growth recorded in the number of American and Canadian visitors, which increased by 15.36% and 12.35% to 162,635 and 102,683, respectively, over the same period.
Number of Tourists by November (in millions)
Source: Ministry of Tourism