Ireland must ‘diversify' its tourism market to counter drop in visitor numbers, says tourism chief
Figures released by Fáilte Ireland show an 18pc decline in tourists from all major overseas markets between January and April of this year versus the same period in 2024.
Tourism operators have also reported that revenue generated by visitors from Great Britain had dropped 52pc compared to last year, while revenues for French holidaymakers dipped by 55pc and Germany by 53pc.
Commenting on the figures, chief executive of the Irish Tourism Industry Confederation (ITIC), Eoghan O'Mara Walsh, said that Ireland must lessen its reliance on the North American tourists due to a series of complex economic factors contributing to their decline.
'The dollar is weakened - I think it's about 15pc in the last three or four months,' he told RTÉ Radio 1.
"Obviously all the tariffs, we fear, are going to impact on the US economy and there's kind of lots of macroeconomic and geopolitical uncertainty out there, which doesn't suit tourism.'
However, Mr Walsh says a proactive approach must be taken to stem the dwindling numbers of US tourists to Ireland.
"I think we need to defend and deepen the US market because we can't just turn our back on our most valuable market.
"But we do need to be more active and penetrate other markets.'
Another challenge facing the tourism sector is Ireland's status as the second-most expensive holiday destination in Europe, according to Eurostat.
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"If you think about...deciding on holiday destinations, we look at what's in our bank account, what's in our wallet.
"Unfortunately the German economy, the French economy, the British economy are all struggling. Therefore, discretionary income is tighter, and therefore the second and third holidays are often sacrificed, and Ireland kind of falls into that category.'
Key to fulfilling this objective, Mr Walsh says, is raising the current passenger cap at Dublin Airport to above 32 million in order to secure the arrival of more overseas visitors.
'We are an island nation. There's no roads and no bridges, no tunnels off the island. If we want to activate and we want to secure access to our key source markets, we need headroom at Dublin Airport,' he said.
"Government have had an awful lot of time to debate it and tease it out and we're still at the same stage as we have been for a long time.'
However, he believes more could be done to incorporate regional airports into the pledge to increase the number of inbound flights.
"I think Government could be doing more in terms of supporting some of the spend at those airports, allowing those airports to incentivise airlines into those regional parts of the country.'
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