Average length of tourist stay doubled: MoF
The average length of tourist stay in Nepal has almost doubled over the past decade and jumped to 13.12 days in 2011/12.
The industry gained foreign currency worth Rs 24.61 billion over the first eight months of the fiscal year, says Economic Survey 2012, the annual flagship report that Ministry of Finance (MoF) released on Saturday.
In 2010/11, the average stay of a tourist was 12.67 days and the industry had churned out Rs 28.63 billion worth foreign currency.
The Survey has attributed the rise in tourist´s average stay and better income to the special tour packages and other schemes that the entrepreneurs launched during the Nepal Tourism Year 2011.
“Tourism industry generated five percent of total foreign currency the country earned during the year,” reads the Survey. In 2002, when the Maoist conflict was at its height and weighing heavy on the industry, tourist´s average stay had dropped to 7.92 days.
Thanks to those efforts, the industry managed to bring in a total of 736,215 tourists during the year, posting a growth of 22 percent over previous year´s arrivals.
