Cruise tourism in Greece might drop as high as 30 percent in 2017 compared to this year, according to the Greek Tourism Confederation (SETE).
SETE representative Andreas Stylianopoulos said that the decrease is irreversible. Stylianopoulos is also president and CEO of Navigator company, international representative of Royal Caribbean cruise company.
Based on cruise ship itineraries for 2017, the Eastern Mediterranean destinations will be reduced to Piraeus, the Saronic Gulf, the Cyclades islands, Crete and south Dodecanese islands. Many cultural and historical destinations are off the itineraries for 2017.
Stylianopoulos said that he recently participated in the Seatrade Cruise Med conference as a speaker and a workshop of the Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA) held in Tenerife. He said that this year’s double-digit increase in the number of cruise passengers is purely coincidental, and is due to the problems encountered by Turkey after the coup attempt and resulted in a transfer of services to Greece.
However, this will turn into a problem for 2017. This is because many Turkish destinations are cancelled, and since many of the Greek destinations were transfer points to Turkey, the Greek destinations are cancelled as well. This will affect hotels, shops, catering services transport and trade in Greek ports and lead to significant public revenue losses.
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