The Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority (SLTDA) is carrying out programmes to attract more German tourists in the wake of adverse advisories and negative reports about the country.
There is a probability of getting more tourists from Germany, SLTDA Chairman Priyantha Fernando said.
He said even if a demand was created, they had identified a lack of seats in airline services coming in from Germany. Therefore, they were having talks on increasing the number of flight seats. Mr Fernando said they were also expecting to bring in more airlines to improve tourism.
Asian-German Sports Exchange Programme Research (AGSEP) Chief Dietmar Doering, said negative travel advisories about Sri Lanka had given the wrong impression to Germans who were interested in travelling to and investing in Sri Lanka. Some travel advisories issued were about unsafe travel conditions due to the aragalaya protests and a disruption of supply chains.
Dr. Doering said he had been living in Sri Lanka for more than forty years, and he had not experienced shortages of essential items and did not face unsafe travel conditions, even during the COVID-19 pandemic and the aragalaya protests.
He said from 1970 to 2018, Sri Lanka had 2.3 million tourist arrivals, while Vietnam had 18 million tourist arrivals in 2018. If Sri Lanka reached nine million tourist arrivals, and those tourists stayed for ten days, with each spending more than US$ 280 for each day, the country would not have needed to go to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and could maintain sufficient foreign reserves, he added.
Sunday Times
