Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 7 February 2024
1. Deputy Brendan Griffin asked the Taoiseach the number of overseas visitors to Ireland for each year since 2018; to provide a breakdown of the country of origin of these visitors and the estimated revenue generated by each category of visitor, in tabular form. [4940/24]
View answerUp to 2020, the CSO employed two survey instruments at airports and seaports to compile statistics on overseas visitors to Ireland. These were the Country of Residence Survey (CRS) and Passenger Card Inquiry (PCI). The former differentiated air and sea passengers into outbound Irish residents and inbound foreign residents. The latter collected additional details from passengers, including the purpose of their visit and their estimated expenditure.
The number of overseas visitors in 2018 and 2019, broken down by area of residence, is presented in table 1 below. For example, table 1 shows that there were 10.6 million overseas visitors in 2018 and 10.8 million overseas visitors in 2019. More visitors came from Great Britain (3.8 million in both years) than from any other area of residence.
The estimated revenue generated by the overseas visitors in 2018 and 2019 is presented in table 2 below. The revenue is estimated by first excluding fares (air and sea) from the visitors declared trip expenditures (item (1) in the table below). The fare receipts of Irish carriers (airlines and ferry operators) are then added to the revenue (item (2) in the table below). This creates an estimate of the total tourism and travel earnings (items (1) and (2)). The total tourism and travel earnings estimated for each of the years 2018 and 2019 were €6.9 billion. Visitors from the USA & Canada contributed most to these earnings, contributing €1.7 billion each year (excluding fares).
In March 2020, survey operations at airports and seaports were suspended due to the public health restrictions in place during the COVID-19 pandemic. As a result, no data were collected on the residencies or expenditure of overseas visitors to Ireland for that period.
In 2023 the CSO resumed full-scale survey operations at airports and seaports again with a new survey methodology for collecting data on overseas visitors. Monthly data for the period June to December 2023 is available on the CSO’s website. Annual results for 2023 will be published in March 2024.
