Tourist arrivals to the Caribbean region including The Bahamas increased by a solid 9.7 per cent during the first half of 2019, when compared to the same period last year, the Caribbean Tourism Organization (CTO) has revealed.

Addressing the media at a news conference at World Travel Market yesterday, CTO chairman Dominic Fedee said this performance was more than double the global average of 4.4 per cent.

Between January and June this year, there were 17.1 million tourist trips to the Caribbean region, 1.5 million more than the corresponding period in 2018.

The foundation of this performance was a strong US market, which grew by 20.2 per cent, totalling a first half record of 8.9 million overnight international tourists.

During the same period, some 2.1 million Canadian tourists stayed in the region, a 2.4 per cent rise when compared to the same period last year.

However, the European market was flat, registering a marginal 0.4 per cent increase to 2.9 million trips, with the UK market down by 1.7 per cent, mainly due to significant declines in Cuba, which fell by 22 per cent, and the Dominican Republic, down by 15.3 per cent.