The number of bookings made by foreign tourists in the first quarter of 2009 has dropped 6.6 per cent year-on-year, but there is an increase in the number of countries with a positive share in bookings, State Agency for Tourism Chair Anelia Kroushkova said Wednesday.

Romania has an 80 per cent rise in bookings in the first quarter of the year compared to the same in 2008 and a 14.8 per cent relative share of the total number of tourists arriving to Bulgaria. Hungarians have also increased bookings by 2.8 per cent, Czechs - by 10.3 per cent, Dutch - by 4.8 per cent, Moldova - by 35 per cent and Armenia by nearly 11 per cent.

Data collected by March showed a 38 per cent rise of organized bookings of Russian tourists and a 50 per cent rise in private trips.

Kroushkova forecast that the decline in bookings for Bulgaria will be overcome in the coming months.

According to agency data, for the same period there was a 21.1 per cent decline of travel costs of Bulgarians abroad, the largest number of trips being those to Greece, followed by Turkey.

The revenue from tourism by February stands at 166 million euro, or 8.7 per cent less than in the same period of 2008.

Source: BTA