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Risposte Turismo predicts 5% passenger growth at Italian ports in 2015

Risposte Turismo predicts 5% passenger growth at Italian ports in 2015
A new study estimates Italian ports will attract around 10.9m passengers this year, representing an increase of 5.4% compared to 2014.

In total, 4,566 cruise ship calls are expected in Italy in 2015, a 2.3% decline year-on-year, according to statistics compiled by research and consultancy company Risposte Turismo.

Civitavecchia, Venice and Naples are at the top of the port league expecting around 2.3m (+9.6%), 1.5m (-10%) and 1.2m (+7.7%) passengers respectively from 806 (-3.1%), 498 (+2%) and 430 (+7.8%) ship calls compared to 2014.

Some of the drivers of this growth and new developments says Francesco di Cesare, president of Risposte Turismo, are Royal Caribbean's Allure of the Seas with regular calls at Naples, Civitavecchia and La Spezia, MSC Crociere's Preziosa and Divina operating in the west Mediterranean, and Costa Mediterranea's overnighting in Trieste and MSC's Magnifica in Brindisi.

‘First reflection, and then action is required,’ continued di Cesare, ‘the industry ports should aim at making sure this recovery is consolidated in the coming years, involving new investments both by the lines and the ports.’

The Cruise Special 2015 report, containing data collected from 40 ports representing 94% of passenger and 91% of cruise calls in 2014, indicates 10.4m cruise passenger movement last year representing a drop of 8.2% compared to 2013.

In 2014 Liguria’s ports including Savona, Genoa and La Spezia attracted  about 2.4m passengers (4.7% increase on 2013) compared to 2.1m in the Lazio region centred on Civitavecchia (-15.6%) and the Veneto region centred on Venice (about 1.7m passengers, with a 4.4% reduction compared to 2013).

These first three regions (Liguria, Lazio and Veneto) handled about 60% of the passengers and 50% of the calls in 2014.

Liguria’s ports figures equal to, respectively, 22.9% of Italian cruise traffic and 19.9% of the total cruise calls registered last year in Italy.

Calabria is however, according to the 2014 data collected by Risposte Turismo, the region with the highest growth compatred to 2013, both in terms of passenger movements (+109.5%) and number of cruise calls (+16.7%), while Liguria leads in absolute terms, (+107,000 passengers and +101 cruise calls).

Venice, according to Risposte Turismo’ data for 2014, had more than 1.5m passenger movements undertaking a turnaround, followed by Civitavecchia and Savona with, respectively, 730,000 and 668,000 figures.

With regard to transit traffic, Civitavecchia firmly holds the lead (about 1.4m), followed by Naples (a little more than 1m) and Livorno (about 624,000), Risposte Turismo calculated.

In 2014, Civitavecchia, Venice, Naples and Savona surpassed the one million passenger milestone while 13 other ports exceeded the threshold of 100,000 passengers.