Italy is the second country of choice for French travellers this year. If the summer season saw a general increase in foreign and domestic tourist arrivals to Italy’s art cities and seaside resorts, it also brought renewed French interest, following the encouraging results of 2021 (2,535,309 arrivals and 6,929,254 overnights).
ENIT, the Italian national tourism board, returned to the IFTM Top Résa B2B fair in Paris Porte de Versailles from 20 to 22 September with 200 Italian destinations, 1,700 brands, 34,000 tourism professionals, and 150 conference sessions.
France is Italy’s fourth largest home market
According to the most recent available data (2021), France accounts for 13% of total foreign tourist spending in Italy (21.3 billion euros) during this phase of recovery from Covid. France is now the second largest foreign market (after Germany), pending the complete recovery of arrivals from the US. In terms of attendance France is the fourth largest home market, accounting for 6.5% of the international total (106 million), trailing only Germany (41.7%), Switzerland (7.8%), and Austria (7.1%).
The Cannes ILTM luxury fair
ENIT will also attend the ILTM luxury fair in Cannes with seven major Italian regions from north to south: Friuli Venezia Giulia (www.turismofvg.it), Lombardy (www.in-lombardia.com) with a focus on the Province of Brescia (www.visitbrescia.it), Tuscany (www.visituscany.com), Lazio (www.visitlazio.com), Basilicata (www.basilicataturistica.it) and Sicily (www.visitsicily.info), while a group of tourism professionals will represent Liguria. Some sixty tour operators will be present on the regional stands - there will be 23 individual participants - with the Italian representatives including TOs, accommodation facilities, hotels and resorts, DMCs, car rental companies, golf courses, associations, festivals, airlines and more.
