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India tops list of tourists in Sri Lanka
The UK, with 58,000 arrivals and Russia at 48,000 came in at the second and third spots on the list. “We are expecting 1 million tourists this year,” Priantha Fernando, chairman of SLTDA, told reporters on Wednesday. A revenue of USD 1.8 billion is expected if the current arrivals totalling 500,000 are to be doubled by the year-end, according to official estimates. The tourism sector is the major foreign exchange earner for the country.However, the onset of the pandemic has crippled this sector, and one of the major reasons for the country’s current economic travails. “2018 was the best year for tourism with 2.3 million arrivals. With USD 4.3 billion in revenues, the tourism sector was placed the third largest foreign exchange earner that year behind expat remittances and the apparel export industry,” Fernando said. In 2019, the sector took a massive hit due to the Easter Sunday terror attack, while in the following two years of 2020 and 2021, Covid-19 spooked tourists, he explained.
Source : Travel World
