The cruise market is expected to register a rather positive performance in 2025.
More specifically, according to estimates by industry executives, a 5.4% increase in passengers is expected compared to 2024.
The honorary president of the Association of Cruise Ship Owners and Maritime Agencies, Theodoros Kontes, told “N” that the total cruise tourist flow amounted to 5.06 million visitors in a total of 4,800 cruise ship arrivals in 2023, while the forecast for 2024 is for 5.55 million passengers and approximately 5,080 arrivals, thus reaching the levels of 2019, the record year before the pandemic, but with a significantly lower number of arrivals.
For the year 2025, a further increase in traffic is expected and the forecast is for approximately 5.8 million passengers in total, in 5,290 ship arrivals.
Kontes stated that there is now an increase in small and medium-sized cruise ships in the Greek maritime area. Referring to the increase in cruise port fees for the high season in the ports of destinations with high traffic, such as Mykonos and Santorini, he said that this will burden each passenger-tourist by 20 euros, while in the remaining ports the fee per passenger will rise to 5 euros.
He estimated that the revenue from port fees will exceed 40 million euros and that they should be properly invested in the various destinations to improve services and infrastructure to serve customers.
He also pointed out that the correct method of carrying capacity per destination should be implemented in our country this year, in order to avoid hypertourism and improve infrastructure and services for ships and passengers.
“Global berth allocation per destination is mandatory for destinations in our country, with a parallel improvement in infrastructure and services,” he underlined.
