Icelandic Tourist Board

The number of foreign passenger departures from the country via Keflavík Airport was around 108 thousand in September, according to figures from the Icelandic Tourist Board and Isavia. We have to go back several years to see similar figures in foreign departures in the month of September. American and Germans were the largest nationalities in August, or roughly 41 of the total count. Since the beginning of the year, about 445 thousand foreign passengers have departed Iceland, a 3.6% decrease compared to the same period last year when the number of foreign passengers departing was about 461 thousand. Compared to 2019, the decrease is 71%.

The Icelandic Tourist Board and Business Iceland, with support from the Ministry of Industry and the Ministry of Innovation, have been working on the restoration of VisitIceland.com in recent months. The website was introduced in connection with the Vestnorden travel conference that took place in Reykjanes this week. The site's content has been reorganized considerably, and information to tourists has been greatly improved, with increased material. The collaborative project on renewing the website is for three years, and the opening of the new page is just the beginning of that process. Continuous changes and improvements to the website may be expected in the coming years.

A handbook has been published by the European Tourism Council (ETC) on "Encouraging Sustainable Tourism Practices." The handbook guides and encourages the tourism industry to have sustainability as a guiding principle in its organization and operation. Authorities, policymakers, institutions, municipalities, associations, companies, and tourists have an important role in changing what is needed on the road to sustainable tourism.

Departures of foreign passengers from Iceland via Keflavík Airport were 152,000 in August, according to figures from the Tourist Board and Isavia, or twice as many as in August 2020. The numbers in 2021 are close to those in 2014. About 336 thousand foreign passengers have departed from Iceland in the period January to August, which is around 25% less than last year. Americans were the largest nationality in August or roughly 38%