24% of tourist accommodation still closed

Portugal’s National Statistics Institute INE estimates that 24% of tourist accommodation remained closed in September because of the Covid-19 pandemic.

And it says that Portugal’s tourism economy did not bounce back in September, despite the good weather, because of the second wave of contagion caused by a Coronavirus mutation believed to have originated in Spain.
INE statistics show that these were 1.4 million guests and 3.6 million nights booked in hotels and guest houses in September, numbers that equate to like-fir-like falls of 52.5% and 53.4% respectively.
The data shows a deterioration in numbers compared to bookings seen over August when the number of guests was 43.2% below the level of the previous year, in which there were 47.1% fewer room bookings compared to the same month.
This is against a backdrop of a month when holidaymakers were returning from their holidays and in which the number of daily Covid-19 cases rose again to record levels in Europe.
“In September, 24.3% of tourist accommodation establishments were closed or did not have any tourists,” says the INE in a bulletin published on Thursday (today). It was also down on August when the percentage stood at 21.2%.
When it came to local residents in Portugal, “nightly room bookings fell 8.5% to 2 million, representing 57.2% of the total, while bookings from non-residents (overseas visitors) fell 71.9%, to 1.5 million.
The number of resident guests was 890,000, which was a decrease of 15.1% and the non-resident guests were 492,000, a decrease of 73.3%, states the INE.
The institute also mentions that the Alentejo “represented the least fall in the number of nights (-19.9%), while the Algarve and Alentejo saw a growth in numbers for residents (+10.3%) and (+5.2%) respectively.
Of the source country markets which displayed the greatest fall in numbers of tourists, the US, Canada and China led the list.