Russian tourist flow to Lithuania grew by almost 150%
Last year Lithuania welcomed 320 thousand Russians, which exceeds 2010’s results by 43%. Lithuania’s State Tourism Department’s reports that the Russians travel to this Baltic country mostly for business (32%), followed by leisure (28%), private and family visits (25%) and shopping (10%).
The Lithuanian side states that Russia is currently on the second place in the number of tourist arrivals to Lithuania, giving ground only to visitors from Poland. Then follows Germany, Belorussia and Latvia. The interest towards tours to Lithuania is also growing in Israel, Ukraine, South Korea, Spain and Belorussia. The overall foreign tourist flow to Lithuania increased by 20% over the previous year, which allowed the country to place second among all European countries in terms of the growth dynamics (the first place went to neighboring Latvia).
“To Lithuania, Russia is one of priority markets, accounting for up to 14% of the total foreign tourist flow to our country – says the Director of Lithuania’s Tourism Department Mrs. Raimond Balnene, adding that the majority of tourists (60%) came from Kaliningrad Region.
Russian tour operators generally agree with each other in judging the tourist flow to Lithuania. “The Russians are interested in Lithuania, but our records show an increase of around 15%” – informed RATA-news Director General of ABClub Mrs. Anastasia Ginters. She also added that among Baltic countries our tourists prefer Latvia, while Estonia and Lithuania share the second position.
The experts explain this distribution of the tourist flow with the fact that Latvia has more accommodation facilities and is more accessible. “As for now one can fly to Vilnus only by a UTAir flight. This March Aeroflot and Transaero start scheduled services on this route. I hope it will positively affect the demand” – Mrs. Ginters outlined.
According to Director General of SatMarket Company Mrs. Irina Setoun, in 2011 Lithuania’s health resort sector was showing stable upturn of around 25-30%. Thus, the most popular resorts proved to be those of Druskininkai area, where the Snoras Snow Area all-season mountain skiing center was opened last year.
Most probably a more significant increase of the tourist flow to Lithuania was being held back by the complexity of obtaining a Schengen multi-visa. The market players remind that since 2009 Latvia and Lithuania, wishing to attract more tourists from Russia, have been actively issuing one-year multi-visas to the Russians. “Lithuania is the only Baltic country that is not rushing to do so – Mrs. Setoun points out. On the other hand, she says, tour operators are only winning as most of the tourists have to use their services to travel.
Let us remind you that since last year Lithuania has been promoting itself using the motto “Lithuania – See it! Feel it! Love it!”. On the international market Lithuania is represented as a country with 1000-years-old traditions and hospitable people. And it brings the results. According to travel.ru, 40% of our citizens, interviewed after their trip to Lithuania, referred to their holiday as “very good”, 56% deemed it “good”. And just 0.4% of Russian tourists rated their trip as “bad” or “very bad”.