Figures released by the Department of Turismo de Tenerife reveal that the island’s tourism industry has enjoyed a 3.77 per cent increase in the number of foreign visitors in July based on last year’s figures, with 450,554 holidaymakers making the trip. Over 2.7 million tourists holidayed on the island during the first seven months of 2010, an increase of 1.35 per cent on 2009. Meanwhile, upmarket hotels have benefitted from the boost the most, with five star establishments seeing a 10.67 per cent increase in bookings in July, while a move from travellers towards cheap holidays based in self-catered apartments and hostels has seen a rise in non-hotel accommodation of 5.02 per cent.

“All things considered, these are some very positive numbers for Tenerife,” says Daniel Ox, Managing Director of online holiday experts Beat the Brochure. “When you consider just how much the volcanic ash cloud - coupled in with recent operator collapses - affected Tenerife’s core markets earlier in the year, these increases are great news for the island. Even Spanish visitors have increased overall, up 6.76 per cent on last year.”

Tenerife’s core markets, the United Kingdom and German, were up 14.79 and 9.31 per cent in July respectively. Significantly, large increases from non-traditional source markets point to a wider trend as the island’s reputation as an affordable holiday destination reaches a wider audience. The number of French tourists booking Tenerife holidays saw the biggest increase, up 37.43 per cent, while Italy and Belgium both saw smaller increases of just over 9 per cent.

“Tenerife has been a longstanding bastion of British and German tourism, but what’s interesting now is that the island is seeing a steady influx of holidaymakers from other countries,” says Ox. “The number of tourists from Russia, for example, has increased 26 per cent based on the same period last year. That in itself is a trend the global industry has taken note of in the past decade as more and more Russians start to look beyond traditional holiday destinations like the Ukraine, and traditional packages like the all inclusive Greece holidays favoured by the country.”