The number of Russians traveling abroad fell by 24% in the first half of the year

In the first half of 2015, number of international trips of Russians decreased by 24% compared with the same period of the last year and amounted to 16.4 million. Meanwhile, the number of international trips with tourism purposes decreased by almost 34%, according to data of the Federal State Statistics Service. The total number of Russian tourists traveling abroad totaled 5.49 million, which is 33.8% lower than in the first half of 2014 (8.29 million). The fall of tourist traffic was noted for almost all countries included the top 45 most popular destinations for Russians. In the first half of the year, the most popular tourism destination became Egypt with 1.054 million Russians which is 13.4% lower than a year earlier. This is the first time in five years, when Egypt managed to bypass Turkey. Since the beginning of the year, Turkey was visited by 1,031,000 Russians, which is by 25.7% less than the year before. The difference between the top two outgoing destinations for Russians amounted to only 20 thousand trips. In third place in the number of tourist trips of Russians is Germany: it was visited by 284.2 thousand people. This is 29.6% below than last year's result. Thailand has lost 53.1% of Russian tourists and was visited by 255.9 thousand people. Italy and Spain completing the top five leaders, their results differ slightly and account for just over 233 thousand people in each country. Thw drop in Russian tourist traffic to Spain was by 43.1%, to Italy - by 34.8%. The most significant drop in tourist flow from Russia captures Tunisia, by 75.4%. For half a year the country was visited by 22.5 thousand Russians, whereas in the first half of 2014 the number was 91.3 thousand people. The leader in the overall number of trips of Russians up to six months became Finland - 1.7 million people. At the same time as tourist destination it was visited by only 118.9 thousand tourists.