Paul Gogarty (Dublin Mid West, Green Party)
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Question 56: To ask the Minister for Arts, Sport and Tourism if he will report on the overseas travel statistics for February 2004, which shows an increase in overseas visitors here, but also a rise in overseas trips from Ireland; if it is of concern to the Government that the gap between inward and outbound trips is again decreasing; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [15341/04]

John O'Donoghue (Kerry South, Fianna Fail)
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The CSO figures for the first two months of this year show a promising start to 2004, with overall numbers up 10% on the same period in 2003. In terms of Ireland's key markets, our performances in North America and continental European markets have again been encouraging, with visitor numbers showing growth of 15% and 11% respectively. I would strike a note of caution, however, in attempting to make any forecasts on the basis of two month figures.

The CSO's full year figures for 2003 are a more solid basis for identifying emerging trends and these are also encouraging, showing a 5% increase in the number of overseas visitors to Ireland which represents a continuing recovery in this vital sector of the economy. Visitor numbers for 2003 exceeded the previous peak achieved in 2000, with 6.3 million visits recorded. In conjunction with this growth in volume terms, revenue earnings grew by just under 3%, to more than €4 billion.

As the Deputy rightly points out, the first two months of 2004 also show an increase in outbound tourism. This has been an ongoing trend in recent years and is largely attributable to the growing level of prosperity among Irish people over the same period.

This greater prosperity has also provided a major boost to Ireland's domestic tourism market. While the CSO figures cited by the Deputy do not include figures for domestic tourism, a separate CSO release last week, the household travel survey, indicates that almost 6.5 million domestic trips were taken in 2003, representing an increase of more than 3% on 2002. In expenditure terms, domestic tourism has shown remarkable growth, with Irish people spending 14% more on domestic holidays than in 2002; this far outstrips the growth in expenditure by Irish people on foreign holidays, for the same period, which stood at 5%.

These figures provide strong evidence that the home market is competing well in the face of stiff international competition and I have every confidence that this trend will continue in 2004.