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Tourism

Global Tourism Growth Slowed in 2018 But Arrivals Still Hit 1.4 Billion

Hannah Sampson

Photo Credit: The Bimmah Sinkhole in Muscat, Oman is shown in this photo from April of 2018. International tourist arrivals grew 10 percent in the Middle East last year. Flickr / hey tiffany!

Skift Take

Travelers are still exploring the world, but growth has cooled slightly. Will 2019 bring a further slowdown, or will the appetite for international travel keep surprising experts?

The Caribbean slumped, the Middle East jumped and Europe continued to add visitors in a year of robust — but slightly more restrained — tourism growth. Across the globe, international tourism arrivals grew by nearly 6 percent to 1.4 billion last year, according to preliminary figures out Monday from the United Nations World Tourism Organization. That's on top of 7 percent growth in 2017, and higher than the 4-5 percent growth the tourism body expected to see last year. In a long-term forecast published in 2010, the United Nation's tourism agency forecast the number of international arrivals would reach 1.4 billion in 2020. A combination

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