Foreign tourist inflow increases by 9% in September

Overnight stays by foreign tourists increased by 9.0 per cent in Finland in September this year compared to the stipulated period of previous year, according to Statistics Finland.

About 0.51 million overnight stays were recorded for non-resident tourists.

However, overnight stays by resident tourists at Finnish accommodation establishments increased by 2.0 per cent from last year and 1.3 million nights were recorded for them in September 2019.

Finnish accommodation establishments recorded a total of 1.8 million overnight stays, which was 3.9 per cent more than one year before.

Among the most important countries of inbound tourism to Finland, overnight stays by Italians increased most in absolute numbers, by 3,600 nights.

This was 38.0 per cent higher than in the year before.

The biggest drop was seen in overnight stays by Swedes, down by 1,400 nights. Their overnight stays were 3.1 per cent down on September 2018.

The biggest group of non-resident tourists were Swedes with 44,600 overnight stays followed by Russians with 42,300 overnight stays. The third largest group was Germans with 41,800 overnight stays, and fourth were Chinese with 32,500 overnight stays. The fifth largest group were tourists from the United States (28,900 nights), sixth was British visitors (26,300 nights), seventh Japanese tourists (25,200 nights) and eight Estonian visitors (19,300 nights).