Sri Lanka's tourism industry posts 35.8% growth in earnings

Earnings from Sri Lanka's lucrative tourism industry in the first five months of 2014 amounted to 901.8 million U.S. dollars, a 35.8 percent rise over the same period last year, the central bank said on Monday.
Meanwhile, latest data from state-run Tourism Development Authority (SLTDA) said the number of Chinese tourists to Sri Lanka in the first six months of 2014 jumped by a significant 137.2 percent year on year to 52,230.
Last month, China remained the country's third largest tourist market, behind India and Britain, with Chinese tourist arrivals up 125.1 percent on year to 8,345.
China also was the fastest growing market to the south Asian island in terms of number of arrivals, easily outstripping Indonesia with 76.9 percent and Russia with 74.8 percent.
Since the end of a three-decade war in 2009, Sri Lanka's tourism industry has boomed, with tourist arrivals reaching over 1. 2 million and earnings hitting 1.7 billion U.S. dollars last year, according to the central bank.
The tropical island aims to attract 2.5 million tourists by 2016, buoyed by fast increasing number of travelers from China.
Only 27,627 Chinese tourists arrived in Sri Lanka in 2012, according to (SLTDA), but the number nearly doubled to 54,288 last year.
This is largely due to massive advertising campaigns launched in China by the Sri Lankan government and greater engagement with Chinese media.
Overall, Sri Lanka attracted 103,175 tourists from around the world last month, compared to 90,279 in June 2013.
In the first six months of this year, a total of 727,353 tourists arrived in the island, marking a 24.6 percent increase over the 583,573 recorded in the corresponding period of 2013.
Most of the tourist arrivals were from Western Europe with 223, 810 tourists visiting in the first six months of this year, a 17 percent rise year on year, the SLTDA said.