Tourist Numbers Tumble On Lanzarote

The number of foreign tourists visiting the holiday island of Lanzarote dropped dramatically in January.  According to figures just released by the Spanish airport operators AENA.  With arrivals down by over 12% versus January 2008.  Falling from 135,617 visitors to 118,894 last month.

The sharpest decline was witnessed in the UK – Lanzarote´s largest market and traditionally the source of well over 50% of all tourist visits made to the island.  With the number of people arriving on flights to Lanzarote from British airports down to 55,281 from 66,680 – a fall of 17.32 %. 

This sharp decline follows on from a disappointing December – when visitor numbers fell by just over 20%.  And clearly indicates that the depreciation of sterling against the euro, combined with declining disposable incomes and falling consumer confidence has started to bite deeply into the islands all important tourist industry.  Which is estimated to account for around 85% of Lanzarote´s total GDP.

Arrivals also fell back in other key markets for island tourism.  With German visitor numbers falling by 11.84%.  And similar declines registered across all of the Scandinavian countries.

Only the Irish market – Lanzarote´s third largest – showed any signs of positive growth.  As visitor numbers from the Republic actually increased by 3.15% last month – with AENA recording a total of 14,717 arrivals from Eire.  So further cementing Lanzarote´s position as the most popular holiday destination in the whole of Spain amongst Irish tourists.

The AENA figures will do little to rebuild confidence in the Lanzarote property sector.  Where both demand and transactions have tapered off sharply over the last six months.  As a result of the international squeeze on mortgage lending and the detoriation of the pound. 

Many local agents now report a growing quantity of price reduced property on their books – but with few buyers in a position to take advantage.  As local banks have tightened their lending criteria and mortgage approvals have fallen sharply.

AENA´s figures also reveal that Lanzarote is at the sharp end of a wider decline in tourist arrivals evident across Spain and the Canary Islands.  As according to FRONTUR (the national body responsible for monitoring tourist movements across the country) foreign arrivals fell by 10.1% across Spain as a whole in January.  And by 7.5% in the Canaries – with the seven islands welcoming a total of 782,000 tourists.  Accounting for 30.5% of all foreign national arrivals for Spain as a whole.