Greece Tourism Downturn for Dutch Holiday Seekers in 2016

The Dutch tourism board, NBTC released new statistics for Dutch holiday makers during the 2016 season. It is speculated that 2016 will see an increase of 100,000 Dutch people opting to spend their summer holiday in the Netherlands from the previous summer of 2015.

While 75 percent of families in the Netherlands are planning a foreign holiday for their summer fun, 2.6 million people will not be leaving the country, with 1.1 million saying that they plan on vacationing at campsites, and 900,000 saying they will go to a holiday park.

It is too soon to for Greece to estimate the losses from the 29 percent downturn in holiday bookings from the Netherlands for the summer 2016 season. In spite of these new statistics, Greece still remains one of the most popular tourist destinations for European holidays.

These numbers are of concern for Greece, as the country relies heavily on tourism which accounts for a considerable amount of revenue, contributing 18% to the nation’s Gross Domestic Product. In 2015 Greece alone, over 26 million visitors came to Greece’s popular tourist destinations such as Athens, Santorini, Myconos, Rodes, Corfu and Crete. The NBTC says that holiday seekers still plan to visit France and Spain, however, due to Greece and Turkey’s current political woes and the refugee crisis, Dutch tourists are not planning as many trips to the two countries.