ArmInfo.Travel agencies in Armenia lost 25% of their income in 2022 due to the revaluation of the dram. Arkady Sahakyan, director-founder of the Avarayr travel agency, stated this during a press conference on March 9.
In particular, he explained that due to the revaluation of the dram, Armenia began to work within the prices of Central and Western Europe. "If earlier, staying in a 3- or 4-star hotel, including excursion programs, tourists in Armenia spent an average of $120-130 per day, today this figure reaches up to $200," he stressed.
In addition, Arkady Sahakyan noted that a small number of travel agencies in 2022 managed to revise their pricing policy. Most of the companies, according to him, worked at prices of 2021, that is, they sold tour packages from June-July 2021 to 2022, when the dollar was about 500 drams.
"Tens of thousands of tour packages were sold when a dollar cost 500 drams, but received 400 drams instead, that is, they lost about 25% only because of the revaluation of the dram," the head of the travel agency said. The second factor in the decline in profits, according to Sahakyan, was associated with the uncontrolled influx of citizens from Ukraine and Russia to Armenia. In this context, the expert noted that we are not talking about tourists, but about labor migrants who moved to Armenia along with their capital. This, according to him, led to a total increase in the cost of the package by 10-15%, which affected restaurants, hotels and transport services.
In 2022, 1.67 million tourists visited Armenia, which exceeded the figure of a year ago 2-fold. At the same time, the vast majority of them are citizens of the Russian Federation (46%), followed by citizens of Georgia (11%), Iran (7%), the United States (3%), Germany (1%).
