CAIRO: The number of U.S. tourists who visited Egypt rose by 4.7 percent in 2014, registering 154,600 tourists compared to 147,600 in 2013, according to a report issued by the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics (CAPMAS) Thursday.
The report summarizes the volume of Egypt-U.S.A economic relations in the fields of import and exports, investments
and tourism.
The total nights spent by U.S. tourists coming to Egypt amounted to 1.7 million in 2014, compared to 1.6 million nights spent in 2013 registering a total slump of 2.3 percent, said the report.
Tourism, Egypt’s second most important source of national income after the Suez Canal provides direct and indirect employment to up to 12.6 percent of the country’s workforce.
However, revenues from tourism, comprising 11.3 percent of Egypt’s gross domestic product (GDP), witnessed a sharp decline in the aftermath of the political instability following Egypt’s 2011 uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak.
The number of tourists visiting Egypt increased by nine percent in the first half of 2015 compared to the same period last year, head of the Tourism Promotion Authority Sami Mahmoud was quoted by Al-Masry Al-Youm Thursday.
“Israel, Turkey, the Canary Islands, Morocco and Dubai benefit from the recession of tourism in Egypt,” according to Mahmoud.