Oman's tourism revenues exceeded RO1.2 billion ($3.1 billion) at the end of last year, with a large share of the revenues coming from local tourism.

According to the Tourism Statistics Bulletin issued by the Omani National Centre for Statistics and Information, local tourism accounted for 73.5 per cent (RO 882.5 million/$2.28 billion) of the total revenue while foreign tourists contributed 26.5 per cent of the total revenue, equal to RO319 million ($827.6 million).

"The total tourist spending in 2016 increased by 10.3 per cent to reach RO319 million compared to RO289 million ($749.8 million) at the end of 2015," the report said.

"The average expenditure of tourists during the last year was RO101.21 ($262.5) and the outbound tourism expenditure increased to RO490 million ($1.2 billion) and domestic tourism to RO882.4 million ($2.28 billion)," it said.

The number of incoming tourists to the sultanate increased by nearly 40 per cent every five years. The number of incoming tourists stood at 1.1 million tourists in 2005, increasing to 1.5 million in 2010 and then to 3.2 million in 2016.

Visiting relatives and friends (41.9 per cent) topped the list of the main purpose of tourism, followed by recreation (33.5 per cent) and work trip (17.7 per cent). - TradeArabia News Service