Namibia’s tourism sector in 2023 fared significantly well when compared with the pre-pandemic year of 2019, with its average occupancy rate increasing from 45.07% in 2019 to 46.3% in 2023.
This is according to the latest statistics from the Hospitality Association of Namibia (HAN).
“While the average room sales in 2023 may have ended up just under 2% lower than in 2019, the average bed occupancy is over 1% higher than four years ago – which speaks to the increase in the share of leisure travel to Namibia,” said HAN CEO, Gitta Paetzold.
Namibia’s portion of leisure travellers was just under 90% in 2023, compared with just under 84% in 2019.
In terms of business travellers, Namibia’s portion dropped from 12.65% in 2019 to 8.86% in 2023.
“This is a sign that both the business and conference travel markets have not yet recovered to the extent that the leisure travel market has recovered and even grown last year,” said Paetzold.
Growth in markets
Namibia’s European…
