For 7 months of 2020 Turkey has lost more than 3,4 million Russian tourists

Russian tourist flow to Turkey in July fell 96 times compared to the same period of 2019. For the first time, at the peak of the season Russia did not enter the TOP-5 source markets for Turkey. In August, the situation will be different: the launch of charters will return the leading positions to Russia.

According to the Ministry of Tourism and Culture of Turkey, for the first 7 months of 2020 the country received 5,44 million foreign tourists, which is almost 5 times less than in the same period in 2019.

The number of Russian tourists in Turkey in January-July decreased even more. During the reporting period, Turkey officially hosted about 322 thousand citizens of the Russian Federation - this is 11 times less than a year earlier (3,75 million people). Generally, in 2020 Turkey lost more than 3,4 million tourists from the Russian Federation.

In July, 932 thousand foreign tourists visited Turkey (a 7-fold decrease compared to July 2019). For the first time, Russia was not included in the TOP-10 of foreign markets due to closed flights to Turkey.

Nevertheless, about 11 thousand of Russians arrived in Turkey in July. This is only 1,17% of the total foreign tourist flow to the country. In July 2019, Russia was the first in terms of the number of tourist arrivals to Turkey (over 1 million people): almost every sixth foreign tourist in this country was from Russia.

In August, Russia resumed flights to Turkey. In the first week since the restart of the charters, 111 thousand Russians arrived in Antalya alone. According to the forecasts of the Turkish side, in August the resort will host more than 450 thousand tourists from Russia.

Last year Turkey received a record 7 million Russian tourists. In 2020 Turkey expects to receive about 12 million foreign tourists, including about 2-2,5 million tourists from Russia.