The number of foreign travelers in Latvia decreased almost three times in 2020
According to the information compiled by the Central Statistical Bureau of Latvia, in 2019 8.3 million foreign travelers visited Latvia, but in 2020 only 3.2 million travelers visited during the pandemic.
The number of travelers from Estonia was relatively stable in Latvia. From the number of Estonians who visited Latvia in 2019, 53% visited Latvia in 2020. The number of travelers from Lithuania and Poland decreased by about half. The number of travelers from Ireland and the Netherlands decreased by 60%, but from Russia, Georgia, Sweden and Austria three times fewer tourists visited Latvia in 2020 than in 2019. Four times less number of tourists and other travelers came to Latvia from Norway and Denmark, five times less from Great Britain, the Czech Republic, Belarus, Germany and Ukraine. In turn, from many countries, such as the United States, China, Australia, etc. the number of travelers to Latvia decreased dozens of times, and this is not shown in the CSB statistical tables.
In 2020, 1.3 million Lithuanians and almost 800 thousand Estonians visited Latvia. In third place were travelers from Russia - about 300 thousand. In 2020, there were also many visitors from Poland (147 thousand) and Germany (100 thousand).
Those service sectors that were focused on serving foreign guests before the start of the pandemic were able to work in 2020 providing only about a third of their services compared to the way they were in 2019. It can be predicted that in the first half of 2021 the situation with foreign travelers and tourists has not improved.
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