Overnight stays by foreign tourists increased by nearly one per cent at Finnish accommodation establishments from last year and good 675,000 nights were recorded for them in January 2019. Overnight stays by resident tourists increased by 1.8 per cent and accommodation establishments recorded around 871,000 of them.
Good 1.5 million overnight stays were recorded at Finnish accommodation establishments in January 2019, which was 1.4 per cent more than one year earlier. 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.
Lapland, the most wanted
The number of recorded nights spent by foreign tourists was nearly 267,000 at accommodation establishments in Lapland and 207,500 in Uusimaa.
In January 2019, the number of nights spent by foreign tourists increased in Lapland by 4.9 per cent, while overnight stays by foreign tourists in Uusimaa decreased by 3.4 per cent.
French tourists were the biggest group of foreign tourists in Lapland with their good 47,000 overnight stays, growing by as much as 19.2 per cent from the year before. The number of overnight stays recorded for visitors from Asian countries was nearly 44,000, of which Chinese visitors made up good 18,000 nights.
In Lapland, overnight stays of Asian tourists increased by 15.5 per cent, while Asians’ stays in Uusimaa grew more moderately and close on 38,000 overnight stays were recorded for them, which is 1.5 per cent more than twelve months earlier.
In addition to French and Asian tourists, accommodation establishments in Lapland recorded good 36,000 overnight stays for British tourists, even though the figure went down by 5.3 per cent from last year. The recorded number of nights spent by Russians in Uusimaa was equal to that by Asians, close on 38,000.
The number of overnight stays by Russian visitors was, however, 15.3 per cent lower than in January 2018. In addition to Russian and Asian visitors, overnight stays were recorded in Uusimaa third most for British tourists. The number of overnight stays by British tourists at accommodation establishments was around 13,000, which was almost the same as in the year before.
Russians, by far the largest group
January has typically been the most popular month for Russian visitors measured by overnight stays at accommodation establishments and the situation was the same this year.
Russians were by far the largest group of foreign tourists with their nearly 146,000 overnight stays. Overnight stays by Russian visitors turned to a decline of around 10 per cent in December 2018 and the same trend appears to continue in January 2019.
Their overnight stays decreased by 11.2 per cent from last year. Russian visitors accounted for 21.6 per cent of all overnight stays by foreign visitors in January 2019. British tourists came second with 64,500 recorded overnight stays. The number was almost the same as one year before; down by just 0.3 per cent.
French and German visitors came next. Almost 58,000 nights were recorded for French visitors, which was 16.2 per cent more than in January 2018. Good 46,000 overnight stays were recorded for German visitors in January. Their overnight stays increased by 7.5 per cent from last year's January.
Almost the same number of overnight stays were recorded at accommodation establishments for Chinese and Dutch tourists, 38,000 to 39,000 nights. Nights spent by Chinese tourists went up by as much as 43.9 per cent whereas those spent by Dutch visitors fell by 8.3 per cent from last year.
Swedish tourism in decline
Among the most important countries of inbound tourism to Finland, overnight stays by visitors from Sweden have been falling almost throughout last year and still decreased in January 2019. Slightly under 25,000 overnight stays were recorded for Swedes at Finnish accommodation establishments, which was 10.0 per cent lower than one year before.
Examined by region, overnight stays increased in January most in Päijät-Häme, 19.9 per cent. Overnight stays increased by 10.9 per cent in South Savo and by 8.8 per cent in Åland. By contrast, the total number of overnight stays decreased in Satakunta, by 19.6 per cent, and in Southwest Finland, by 9.6 per cent. In the whole country, overnight stays increased by 1.4 per cent from January 2018.
Overnight stays in hotels increased
In January 2019, the total number of nights spent in hotels was good 1.3 million, which was 1.8 per cent more than twelve months earlier. Overnight stays by foreign tourists increased by 1.4 per cent and hotels recorded a total of 571,000 of them.
Recorded nights spent by resident tourists in hotels numbered nearly 754,000. The number was 2.1 per cent higher than in January 2018.
The occupancy rate of hotel rooms was 50.1 per cent in January. One year earlier, it was nearly the same at 50.2 per cent. Among the regions, the highest occupancy rates of hotel rooms were measured in Uusimaa, 60.7 per cent, and Lapland, 60.2 per cent. In Rovaniemi, the hotel room occupancy rate rose to 73.7 per cent and in Kittilä to 73.6 per cent. In Vantaa and Helsinki, the measured occupancy rate of hotel rooms was 65.9 per cent in both.
In January 2019, the realised average price of a hotel room was 104.51 euros per day for the whole country. Twelve months previously, it was 103.36 euros.
