Total number of guests reached 1,117,840 in the January–September period of this year from 1,145,025 guests in the same period of 2016, registering a decline of 2.4 per cent, according to the data released by the National Centre for Statistics and Information (NCSI).
Occupancy rate at the hotels increased to 54.7 per cent during the first nine months of 2017 compared with 54.3 per cent during the same period of last year.
Guest from African countries witnessed a 28 per cent growth to 7,690 at the end of September 2017 compared to 6,008 during the same period of 2016. There was a 26.5 per cent growth in the number of guests from European countries compared to the same period of 2016.
Guests from GCC countries this year declined 6.9 per cent to 170,366 from 183,046 in the same period of 2016, while
that from Arab countries witnessed a 12.2 per cent decline to 49,147.
There was an 18.1 per cent decline in the number of Omani guests to 316,914 compared to 387,113 last year.
The number of Asian guests declined by 9.7 per cent to 118,554 from 131,357 in 2016. The American guests registered a 4.9 per cent decline from 38,973 at the end of September last year to 37,054 at the end of September this year.