by Brian Major
Last updated: 2:25 PM ET, Fri September 22, 2023
More than
seven million travelers have visited the Dominican Republic through August of 2023,
a 25 percent increase over the same period in 2022, according to Dominican
Ministry of Tourism data.
The total
includes 782,000 tourists in August, an all-time record for the month, according
to the agency.
The Ministry
predicts 10 million travelers will visit the Dominican Republic by the end of 2023,
the country’s highest-ever total, eclipsing the 7.5 million combined land and
cruise-ship visitors the country welcomed in 2019, according to Caribbean
Tourism Organization (CTO) statistics.
Additionally,
Dominican Republic tourism is expected to increase by 54 percent during the
fourth quarter of 2023, ranking the country first in global post-pandemic
tourism growth for the period, according to travel analytics firm ForwardKeys.
Dominican
Republic tourism is expected to grow by 10 percent year-over-year in 2023 compared with
2019, said Ministry officials in a statement.
Land-based visitors
to the country stay an average of eight days, said officials. Meanwhile, “while
air travel remains the method of choice” for visiting the country, “the cruise
segment made a strong showing in the first months of the year and has remained
a key element of the [country’s] current numbers."
To date in
2023, the Dominican Republic has hosted 1.5 million cruise ship travelers,
surpassing the 1.1 million cruise vacationers the country welcomed in 2019, according
to CTO.
In addition
to the present cruise ports in La Romana and Puerto Plata, the Dominican
Republic will open a port in Pedernales in December, said officials.
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