North sees drop in visitors from Republic, strong pound cited

The number of people who chose to visit and stay in the North from other places grew to 2.2 million last year- but fewer of them came from the Republic according to new tourism statistics released on Thursday.

The latest figures show the total number of overnight trips recorded in the North grew by 11 per cent in 2014 to 4.5 million - but more than half, 2.5 million, of these trips were made by local residents.

In contrast 1.2 million overnight visitors came from Britain, 400,000 from the Republic and about 600,000 of the overnight trips were taken by people living outside of the UK and Ireland.

The figures show an estimated drop of about 3 per cent in the numbers of visitors from the Republic who stayed overnight in the North last year.

The latest annual tourism statistics highlight that while the number of external overnight visitors rose by 4 per cent last year this did not translate into a equivalent boost for the local tourism industry.

According to the North’s Statistics and Research Agency, associated spending by external visitors fell by £17 million in 2014 to £514 million.

It says the “strong pound” may have been to blame for this last year.

The agency credits a number of high-profile sporting events such as the opening stages of the Giro D’Italia in May and Carl Frampton’s world title boxing fight in September and the growing success of the local film industry as being among the key reasons why tourism numbers increased last year.

The North’s enterprise minister Jonathan Bell says overall the 4.5 million recorded overnight visitors spent a total £751 million in the local economy last year.

Mr Bell said he was encouraged by the latest figures.

“Our key Programme for Government targets for visitor numbers and tourism revenue have been achieved for 2014 and we are well on our way to achieving our 2015 targets.

“With tourism expenditure of £751 million we are now three-quarters of the way towards reaching our long term goal to make tourism here a £1 billion industry by 2020. These latest figures keep us well on track for success,” the minister added.

The official figures do not include cruise ships numbers last year but these show that by the end of the 2014 cruise season 69 cruise ships docked in the North bringing up to 121,000 passengers and crew on board.