(MENAFN- NewsIn.Asia) Colombo, May 8 (newsin.asia) - Sri Lanka's tourist arrivals recorded a 12.6 percent growth in April, when compared to the same period last year with over 180,000 tourists visiting the island country, statistics from the Tourism Ministry showed here Tuesday.
In April, the largest source market for tourists was India, followed by United Kingdom and China.
India recorded 29,860 arrivals, United Kingdom 26,063 arrivals, China 17,462 arrivals, Australia 14,023 arrivals and Germany 10,803 arrivals.
According to statistics, up to April 30, 888,353 tourists have visited Sri Lanka, a 16.1 percent growth over last
year when 765,202 tourists visited the country during the same period.
Tourism Minister, John Amaratunga said the government will target a revenue of 4.4 billion U.S. dollars through its tourism sector this year.
Sri Lankan Tourism earned a revenue of 3.9 billion dollars in 2017 and this year, the minister said earnings had already grown by 17 percent year on year to 1,312.9 million dollars in the first quarter.
Amaratunga last week said that the government had signed an agreement with a leading Chinese tour operator in a bid to attract more Chinese tourists to visit the island country.
Amaratunga said local tour operator Green Leaves Leisure, backed by the tourism ministry, had signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with China's Yingke Travel, which is based in Beijing, to provide better facilities for Chinese tourists and promote Sri Lanka as a world class tourist destination.
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