The tourist balance of payments last year approached pre-pandemic levels with a surplus of 17.1 billion euros, equal to 0.9% of GDP, slightly lower than the value of 2019 when the surplus was equal to 1 % of GDP. Last December there was a surplus of 200 million, down from the balance of 400 million in the same month of 2021. In that month, tourist outflows amounted to 2.1 billion, more than doubling against an increase in the 65% of revenue, about 2.4 billion compared to December 2021.
According to data from the Bank of Italy, which collects goods and services purchased by natural persons in countries where they are not resident in relation to travel to these countries, the stock of income and expenditure in 2022 has doubled compared to 2021 values when many destinations were inaccessible due to health restrictions. In particular, between January and November, foreign tourists spent 39.7 billion in Italy while Italians traveled around the world 22.8 billion. As a term of comparison, it is enough to remember that in 2019 almost 42 million foreigners spent their holidays in Italy, generating revenue of over 28 billion euros. Holiday trips have largely recovered from the sharp drop recorded during the pandemic both in terms of spending by foreigners in Italy and in terms of spending by Italian travelers abroad, while business trips, a segment which in the pre-covid era was worth around 13% of total spending, have already seen realignment with 2019 values.
As regards the trend of expenditure between the countries of the Union in the excellent year 2022, the values of 2019 were beaten. Analyzing the trend of long-haul travel, on the other hand, the absence of guests arriving from Far East because, for example, China reopened its borders to international tourism on 8 January while group tours, including towards Italy, will resume on an experimental basis from next Wednesday. Guests arriving from North America largely contributed to the balance of payments balance in 2022 and since spring have started to visit the Peninsula and its cities of art en masse again. Just between spring and summer, in just 6 months, foreign travelers spent almost 28.3 billion with a positive balance of 13 billion. Work should be done on seasonal adjustment of incoming, with appropriate communication campaigns, to entice foreign guests to visit Italy at other times of the year, avoiding summer overcrowding. In this sense, help can come from Pnrr funds, including the 500 million from the Thematic Fund for Tourism presented yesterday by the Ministry of Tourism and the EIB to support the sector. “A support that will stimulate growth and strengthen the competitiveness of tourism businesses in terms of environmental sustainability, innovation and digitization” comments Daniela Santanchè, Minister of Tourism. The fund will operate through the financial intermediaries Equiter, with the Intesa Sanpaolo Group, Banca Finint, in collaboration with Finint Investments SGR, with Sinloc, to which a third financial intermediary will be added.