The number of nights that foreign tourists stayed at Finnish accommodation establishments went up to nearly 747,000 in July, a rise of 1.9 per cent from July 2012, revealed figures from Statistics Finland.
There was also an increase of 0.3 per cent to 2.3 million in the number of resident tourists staying in accommodation establishments. Overall, there was an increase of 0.7 per cent to over three million in the total number of nights that tourists stayed in these establishments in July this year.
Russian tourists made up the largest group of visitors from abroad, with 168,000 overnight stays in July – a 7.8 per cent rise from the same month last year. Swedish tourists were next with 123,000 stays – an increase of seven per cent. There were 84,000 overnight stays by Germans – in third place –a 10.1 per cent drop from July last year.
There was a jump to 17.7 per cent in the number of British overnight stays, which reached 28,000. Furthermore, tourism from East Asia increased significantly, with Japanese tourists accounting for nearly 24,000 overnight stays (46.5 per cent increase) and Chinese tourists for almost 17,000 overnight stays (44.5 per cent increase).
For the January-July period this year, the total number of overnight stays at Finnish accommodation establishments was 12.4 million, a 0.4 per cent drop from the same period last year.