The year 2015 will remain a historic one in terms of the number of visitors arriving on our shores. To date a record number of 254, 017 visitors have been visiting the paradisiacal islands of the Seychelles. This was confirmed this afternoon in a small press briefing held at the Seychelles Civil Aviation Authority’s headquarters at the Seychelles International Airport.
The briefing was organized by the Seychelles Civil Aviation Authority in collaboration with the Ministry for Foreign Affairs and Transport, the Ministry for Tourism and Culture, and the Seychelles Tourism Board. It was attended by the respective Ministers: Mr Joel Morgan and Mr. Alain St Ange, as well as the Principal Secretary for the Seychelles Tourism Board, Mrs Anne Lafortune, Mr Roy Kinnear, the Air Seychelles CEO, Air Seychelles’ General Manager of Aeropolitical and Public Affairs, Mr Alan Renaud and the SCAA Board and Executive members.
“It is expected that by the end of the year, the number will increase to 268 million visitors. This comes as a result of the strong air connectivity strategy that the Government has put into place hence today we have 71 bilateral air services agreement, 8 airlines and about 61 flights per week. This is a great achievement for a small country such as ours” says Minister Joel Morgan.
“The fact that SCAA is investing more than 200 million rupees in the airport’s infrastructural development this year, and the fact that our national airline: Air Seychelles in partnership with Etihad, are together bringing more than 50% of passengers to Seychelles, plus the additional support of other airlines such as Mihin Lanka, Emirates, Kenya Airways, Condor, Air Austral and Ethiopian Airline, proves that the Air transport industry is progressing in the right direction.”
Staffs of the Seychelles Civil Aviation Authority and the Seychelles Tourism Board were highly praised for their efforts and dedication which has allowed us today to harvest the fruit of their hard work and great collaboration in propelling the tourism industry forward.
For his part Minister Alain St. Ange saluted the effort of Air Seychelles and Seychelles Tourism board staff working tirelessly to ensure that French remains our top market destination.
“We will continue to work together to consolidate the Paris market, and to invest in the visibility of Seychelles abroad and most importantly, to remain relevant globally. We cannot sit back, criticize and do nothing. We need to continue to strengthen our efforts in attracting visitors to our islands, sell our destination, combine our efforts and carry on with the hard work that we have started” said Minister St. Ange.
The Tourism Minister also gave the details of number of visitors per destination.
| Country | No. of visitors |
| France | 35, 206 |
| Germany | 34, 057 |
| Italy | 20, 116 |
| United Arab Emirates | 19,664 |
| UK & Eire | 15, 595 |
| China | 13, 508 |
Also remarkable is that 60 thousand residents have travelled this year.
The SCAA board chairman Captain David Savy, and the SCAA CEO Mr. Gilbert Faure reiterated the need that all partners in the industry work together to ensure that we keep investing in this very important economic venture, and that we put Seychelles and its people first.
It was also confirmed during the ceremony that Air Seychelles will be starting its Beijing flights as of early next year.