There have those who think that the British interest in Morocco has peaked. However, following the data of visitors to our site and those of other English language blogs, the growth rate is not only being maintained but increasing.
The importance of this, if it does translate into even more visitors, is as a notice to the tourist authorities to increase the amount of material available to English speaking visitors.
For the last few months the British visitors per day has been sitting at around 20 -25%. Now it has risen as the graph shows. We suspect this is a peak and that it will settle back in the next few weeks to around 25% while our French visitors whose numbers decreased during the elections, will return to about 10-12%. Another encouraging indicator is the number of people within Morocco who are regular visitors to the site. On a daily basis this varies between 13 and 20% on average.
Much of the fluctuation in figures is also due to people doing research for upcoming holidays and also events such as the Fes Sacred Music Festival.
Tourism rise by 30%
Meanwhile, Morocco's revenue from tourism rose 30 percent last year to reach 53 billion dirhams (about USD 6.4 billion), according to the Minister of Tourism and Craft Industries, Adil Douiri.
He told the weekly Cabinet meeting here that the number of tourists registered a 12 percent increase to 6.5 million last year. The Tourism Minister, who was quoted by Communication Minister and Government Spokesman Nabil Benabdellah at a press briefing, also predicted that the accommodation capacity of Morocco would exceed 214,000 beds by 2010.
Tags: Moroccan Morocco Fes, Maghreb news
6 comments:
Your comments are welcome. As a visitor from Bristol in the UK, I find Morocco fascinating but frustrating when it comes to information in English. Thankfully we have your blog!
Kind Regards
Chris
I notice the low number of Mongolians! Maybe you could target them just to add to the mix - LOL. I enjoy your blog
Very droll! We actually have had visits from 157 plus countries, but I can't remember if Mongolia was one of them. Next time you are there, log in from an internet cafe will you?
Thanks for the comment
I guess the site is also important for people who do not speak French like Poles, Latvians and others who learn English in school.
Excellent news that tourism has increased bringing more money into the economy. We who live here need to do all we can to make the tourists feel welcomed - even when it is not so easy.
Hi
I just wanted to say how much I have enjoyed reading The View From Fez. I have been reading it daily in preparation for a visit during the sacred music festival. You are doing a great job.
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