Male passengers on August cruise liners outnumber females

According to the National Statistics Office (NSO), cruise passenger traffic in August in stood at 68,722 – up by 30.15 - over the corresponding month in 2010. There were 30 cruise liner calls with each carrying an average of 2,291 passengers.

The statistics also show that male passengers made up 51.4% of the total, whilst the majority of passengers fell within the 40-59 age group (26,349), followed by the 0-19 age bracket (16,616).

The majority of passengers were in transit and amounted to 52,189, while landings in Malta increased to 8,212 and embarkations from Malta reached 8,321.

NSO also reports that cruise passengers from EU Member States stood at 61,929, an increase of 48.9% when compared to the previous year.

The majority of EU passengers came from Germany (23,474) while another significant share of passengers came from Italy (18,495). Cruise passengers from Non- EU countries registered a drop of 39.5% and amounted to 6,793, a decrease mainly caused by a significant decline in the American market.

Total cruise passengers in the first eight months of 2011 stood at 348,744, of which 78.9% came from EU countries. The largest proportion of EU passengers came from Germany and Italy and stood at 100,232 and 71,761 respectively.

Non-EU passengers advanced by 23.2 per cent when compared to last year, and amounted to 73,700. This was brought about by a substantial increase in the number of American passengers, who comprised 42.9% of total Non-EU traffic.

The largest share of cruise passengers was between 40 and 59 years old and stood at 123,599 passengers. These were followed by the 60-79 age group numbering 88,151 (Table 2). Female passengers outnumbered males and stood at 176,674.

In total, there were 173 cruise liner calls since January - 16 more than the corresponding period in 2010. There was a slight increase in the average number of passengers per vessel for the period under review when compared to last year, with 2,016 passengers per vessel.