BUDAPEST: In an apparent improvement for the Hungarian tourism sector, the number of nights spent by both domestic and foreign tourists in local accommodation increased by 16% and 17%, respectively, in November, compared to the same month a year earlier, the Central Statistical Office (KSH) said this morning in a first reading of data.
The number of international tourist arrivals grew by 18% and that of international tourism nights by 17%, reaching 900,000 in November compared to the same month a year earlier. According to the KSH, one of the chief reasons behind the growth in international tourism nights is the low figures measured during the base period due to the refugee crisis in late 2015.
In terms of source countries, the number of nights spent by guests arriving from the Czech Republic and Italy grew the most, by 28%, while 4.9% more guests arrived from Germany, accounting for a tenth of the tourist nights spent in domestic accommodation establishments, according to data from the KSH.
The number of domestic guests grew by 10% and that of tourism nights spent by them by 16%, to 887,000, which may be due to the turnover-increasing effect of the long weekend in November, the KSH noted.
In November, room occupancy in hotels increased by 5.9 percentage points to 54.7%, while the total gross revenue of accommodation establishments (HUF 30 billion) was 17% higher compared to the same month a year earlier.
Because of the long weekend in early November hotel prices were higher than usual for this time, while tourists preferred hotels providing a higher level of services, the KSH noted.
As of on the last day of November, the number of units operating in Hungary (2,452) was almost unchanged compared to the base year, while the number of available places in accommodation grew by 0.6% (to 214,000).
In the January-November period, accommodation establishments registered 6.5% more, or a total of 25.9 million tourism nights, according to KSH data. Foreign guests spent 6.0% more (13 million), while domestic guests spent 7.0% more (13 million) tourism nights in accommodation establishments, the KSH said.
