Nearly two million tourists visited Kyrgyzstan since the beginning of the year.

Almost two million tourists visited Kyrgyzstan since the beginning of the year.

As stated by the director of the Tourism Department, Azamat Jamankulov, in the first half of 2017, Kyrgyzstan was visited by 1.97 million tourists — this is 349 thousand more than last year. The budget received 38.8 million soms, while in the same period of 2016, 31 million were collected.

Jamankulov noted that the boarding houses were filled to 80 percent last summer. This is facilitated by the improvement of infrastructure and roads in the Issyk-Kul region.

In 2016, Kyrgyzstan was visited by 1.2 million tourists, of which 58.3% came to the republic for leisure.

According to estimated data, in 2016, tourism revenues amounted to $415.6 million, an increase of 1.4% compared to 2015. The number of foreign citizens visiting Kyrgyzstan from CIS countries increased by 2.6%, while from countries outside the CIS decreased by 6.6%.