Oman tourism: 7% rise in hotel occupancy until June, reveals NCSI data

Muscat: There was a 7 per cent increase in number of guests at three/five star hotels in the Sultanate at the end of June 2017 compared to the same period of 2016.
The total number of guests stood at 758,601 compared to 709,081 guests last year, according to the data released by the National Centre for Statistics and Information (NCSI).
The total occupancy rate grew up 0.8 per cent to reach 57.3 per cent during the period under review compared with 56.8 per cent last year.
The total revenue from three/five star hotels saw a 3.3 per cent growth to OMR97,240,000 this year against OMR94,130,000 in 2016, according to the data.
There was a 36.1 per cent growth in the number of guests from European countries to 332,505 guests until the June end 2017 compared to 244,235 guests last year.
The number of guests from GCC countries saw a 24 per cent increase to 78,250 guests this year compared to 63,110 during the same period last year, the data showed.
The number of guests from other Arab nations stood at 32,674 against 31,327 guests last year showing a rise of 4.3 per cent while guests from African countries reached 4,774 until the end of June 2017 compared to 3,945 guests last year, which recorded a 21 per cent growth. However, there was a 18.9 per cent fall in the number of the Omani guests at 3/5 star hotels this year so far to 190,737 compared to 235,262 last year.
There was also a 8.2 per cent fall in the number of guests from Asian countries to 76,651 compared to 83.476 guests, the NCSI data showed.
There was a 0.3 per cent decline in the number of guests from the United States (US) to 26,652 guests as against 26,728 guests during the same period of 2016.
Guests from the Oceanic region too registered a 4.6 per cent decline to 6,560 guests compared to 6,877 guests while guests whose nationality was not stated too registered a 30.6 per cent fall to 9,798 compared to 14,120 guests in 2016, according to the NCSI statistics.
In 2016, there 1,592,128 guests at 3/5 star hotels and the revenue was RO 191 million, according to NCSI data.