Bank of Greece data showed on Monday that revenues from Greece’s leading tourism industry have failed to keep pace with arrival numbers, even during the annual summer crisis that has raised fears of overtourism.
The bank said the number of non-resident arrivals to Greece in the January-August period increased by 9.9% compared to the same period of the previous year, while revenues rose by only 3.2%.
She added that in August alone, industry revenue fell by 1.8 percent compared to last year, even as the number of tourists grew by 6.6 percent.
Government spokesman Pavlos Marinakis downplayed the trend, telling reporters on Monday that “the overall numbers for the entire season indicate that we are heading towards another record year.”
The numbers could balance out by the end of the year, once September is taken into account, according to financial news site moneyreview.gr.
Some experts have blamed high temperatures and heatwaves for short stays, as well as tourists from northern Europe – mostly in Greece – who are increasingly taking fewer vacations and cutting back on spending.
A record 32.7 million foreign tourists visited the Mediterranean country in 2023. The National Bank of Greece said in June that it expects this number to reach 35 million in 2024.
Acknowledging the pressure on some popular destinations such as Mykonos and Santorini, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis last month announced a €20 ($22) fee for cruise passengers disembarking on the islands.
But the Prime Minister insisted that Greece “does not have an overtourism problem”.
What the country faces is “a high concentration of tourists in a few specific destinations over a few months during the year,” he said at a tourism event last week.
Mitsotakis said facilities were exhausted on some Aegean islands, and authorities temporarily froze new tourist construction permits on Mykonos and Santorini.