Turkish domestic tourism expenses up 10.8% in Q1

By Gokhan Ergocun

ISTANBUL (AA) - Turkish domestic tourism expenditures rose 10.8% year-on-year in the first quarter of 2019, according to the Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat) on Tuesday.

Trip spendings of domestic tourists reached 6.98 billion liras (some $1.25 billion), during the first three months of 2019.

The number of domestic trips with one or more than one overnights dropped 9% to 14.1 million in the same period.

In the quarter, domestic visitors made 107.6 million overnights.

The average number of overnights was 7.6 and the average expenditure per trip was 496 Turkish liras (some $89.4).

"In this quarter, while 96% of domestic tourism expenditure was individual with 6.7 billion Turkish liras ($1.2 billion), 4% of it was package tour expenditures with 281.7 million Turkish liras ($50.7 million)," TurkStat said.

Visiting relatives was the primary purpose of trips at 67%, followed by travel, leisure, and holiday at 17.9%, and health at 6.6%.

"Domestic visitors stayed mostly at the 'house of friend and relative' with 83.99 million overnights," it said.

The U.S. dollar/Turkish lira exchange rate was 5.55 at the end of the first quarter.