Visitor arrivals decline by 15 percent in first quarter of 2023
The first quarter of visitor arrivals to Solomon Islands in 2023, records a total of 8,323 visitors, a decrease of 15.8% compared to the previous quarter (4th quarter 2022).
In contrast to the same quarter a year ago (during the Covid-19 period), an increase of 697.2% was recorded.
The National Statistics Office released the latest bulletin on Friday 26th May 2023.
The Government Statistician Douglas Kimi said, returning residents made up 52.2% of arrivals for first quarter 2023. This was followed by Visitors with 46.9% of arrivals and the remaining 0.9% were Intending residents.
“Visitor arrivals for the first quarter decreased by 7.3% to 3,900 visitors, compared to the fourth quarter 2022 figure of 4,207 visitors.
“There was an increase of 1,318.2% in visitor arrivals from first quarter 2022 to first quarter 2023.
“Arrivals by country of residence for the first quarter 2023 showed that Australia (36.6%) recorded the largest group of visitors to the Solomon Islands.
“This was a 19.7% decrease to 1,426 Australian visitors compared to the fourth quarter of 2022 figure of 1,775.”
The next largest group of visitors were from Other Asia (11.3%) followed by Fiji (9.2%), United State of America (9.0%), Papua New Guinea (6.7%), New Zealand (6.1%), Other Pacific (4.2%), China (3.5%), Vanuatu (2.8%), Japan (2.5%), and United Kingdom and Other Country (1.5%).
Visitor arrivals by month showed that March recorded the highest number of arrivals in the first quarter of 2023 with 1,529 visitors. This was followed by month of February with a total of 1,249 visitors and January the least with 1,122 visitors.
The first quarter of 2023 recorded a total of 1,222 tourists who spent an average of almost 14 days in the country. Australian residents made up the highest proportion of tourists (42.7%) for the quarter, with an average stay in the country of almost 14 days. Residents from United States of America made up the next largest group of tourists (15.5%), followed by Other Asia (9.2%), Papua New Guinea (7.2%), Other Europe (3.8%), Fiji (3.4%) and New Zealand (3.2%).
The most common reason for visitors during the quarter was for Business and Conference (30.6%). This was followed by Holiday and Vacation (28.8%), Other Reason (24.7%), Visit Friends/Relatives (13.4%), and 2.5% for Transit and Stop over.
The distribution of visitor arrivals by broad age groups for first quarter 2023 showed that 78.2% of visitors were in the 25 years to 64 years age range. The youngest age group, 0-24 years were 9.2% and the oldest age group, 65 years and over represented 10.0% of total visitor arrivals. The remaining 2.5% were visitors who did not state their age. Male visitors represented more than half of the total visitors’ arrivals (69.3%) and female visitors made up 30.7% of arrivals this quarter.
Visitor by Occupation showed that the “Professional and Technical” category made up the largest percentage of occupations (39.4%) during the quarter. This was followed by Administration and Managerial (17.2%), No Work (13.6%), Production and Related Work (7.7%), Other Occupation (6.3%), Service Worker (4.2%), Clerical & Related work (3.5%), Student (3.4%), Sales Worker (3.2%), Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (1.3%), and 0.3% for Not Stated.
The most popular carriers during the quarter were the Solomon Airlines who carried (66.3%) of total visitors, followed by Air Niugini (24.0%), Fiji Airways (6.6%), Unscheduled Flight (2.7%) and Air Nauru (0.4%)
There was no record of visitors from Brisbane to Munda flights since the reopening of International borders in July 2022. Munda international airport is yet to be reopened.
ENDS WITH THREE CHARTS.///