Turkey: Tourism income jumps 22% to $14B in Q3

By Gokhan Ergocun

ISTANBUL (AA) - Turkey's tourism income jumped by nearly a quarter this July-September to $14.03 billion, the country's statistical authority said on Thursday.

The country's tourism revenue soared 22% in the third quarter, up from $11.5 billion in the same period last year, TurkStat announced.

"While 82.1% of this income (excluding GSM roaming and marina service expenditures) was obtained from foreign visitors, 17.9% was obtained from citizens residing abroad," it said.

Individual expenditures constituted nearly $9.9 billion of the total tourism income in the three-month period, while some $4.1 billion of the revenues came from package tour expenditures, official figures showed.

The country welcomed some 21.6 million visitors in the same period, a 15% rise on a yearly basis -- 85.3% foreign and 14.7% Turkish citizens living abroad.

TurkStat said visitors' average expenditures were $649 per capita, as foreign visitors spent $623 per capita and Turkish citizens spent $789.