The crisis caused by the coronavirus and the strict restrictions imposed by the government on traveling to curb the spread of the disease sank tourism, especially from abroad, also in the third quarter of 2020.
In September, overnight stays by foreign tourists declined by 83.1% compared with the previous year and only 90,000 were recorded for non-resident tourists. The drop was smaller in the case of domestic tourism: nights spent in accommodation establishments by Finnish residents decreased by 12.3% and 1.15 nights were recorded.
Adding both markets, national and international, Finnish accommodation establishments recorded a total of 1.23 million overnight stays, which was 32.3 per cent lower than one year before.
These figures are preliminary data from Statistics Finland’s statistics on accommodation establishments and they have been collected from accommodation establishments with at least 20 beds or caravan pitches with electricity connection.
Source: Statistics Finland.
Russians, the biggest drop
Overnight stays did not increase from any of the most important countries.
The biggest drop was seen in overnight stays by Russians, down by 39,900 nights. Their overnight stays were 95.6% down year on year. The smallest drop was seen in overnight stays by Estonians, down by 5,900 nights. This was 30.2% lower than one year before.
In September, the biggest group of foreign visitors were Estonians with 13,600 nights. The second largest group was Germans with 8,900 overnight stays. The third largest group was Thais with 8,300 and fourth Swedes with 6,800 overnight stays.
Source: Statistics Finland.
Visits to hotels
The total number of nights spent in Finnish hotels was 0.91 million, which was 37.8% less than twelve months earlier. But of these only 57,000 nights were spent by foreign tourists, which represents a decrease of 86.5%.
Among the regions, the highest occupancy rates of hotel rooms were measured in North Ostrobothnia (52.1%), and in Kainuu, (51.1%).
In Helsinki, the hotel room occupancy rate was 25.1%, 39.1% in Tampere, 45.9% in Turku, 59.8% in Oulu and 32.6% in Rovaniemi.
Fall by regions
Accommodation establishments in Uusimaa recorded 38,000 overnight stays by non-resident tourists and accommodation establishments in Lapland 7,000.
Overnight stays by foreign tourists declined by 88% in Uusimaa and 78.8% in Lapland from one year ago.
The share of Uusimaa in all overnight stays by foreign visitors was 43% and that of Lapland 8%.
