Hawaii's latest tourism statistics a mishmash

(The Center Square) - Hawaii's tourism numbers from July signal improvement in some areas and a slight decline in others, according to statistics released Thursday by the Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism.

The number of visitors is down 1% from July 2023. But spending by tourists, when adjusted by inflation, is up 2.6% from last year at $207 billion.

A year after the Maui wildfires, the island's arrival numbers are beginning to improve, according to the department.

"Visitation to the island of Maui continued to improve in July 2024 with 237,495 visitor arrivals; the highest since the wildfires, which represents a recovery rate of 79.9 percent from the pre-wildfire level," said DBEDT Director James Kunane Tokioka.

The statistics show Hawaii continues to recover from the pandemic. The number of July arrivals represents a 93% recovery compared to the same month in 2019, according to the DBEDT. Visitor spending in July 2024, when compared to July 2019, is up 22%.

"Though our visitor industry is still recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic and Maui wildfires, the July visitor statistics showed some reasons for encouragement," Tokioka said. "Visitor arrivals from the U.S. West market at more than half of a million in July 2024 were the highest during the past two years. The 66,557 visitors from Japan in July were the third highest since March 2020 for this market."

The year-to-date numbers show a 3.3% decrease when compared to the same seven-month period in 2023. Visitor spending was down 3.9% from the previous year but 16.9% higher than it was in the first seven months of 2019, according to DBEDT.

The future looks bright, according to Tokioka.

"It is expected that visitor arrivals from the U.S. markets will remain above the 2019 levels for the remainder of the year and arrivals from Japan will continue recovering as the Japanese exchange rate has been improving during the past few weeks," Tokioka said.