Turkey expects 40M tourists in 2018

Turkey expects 40 million tourists this year, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said on Saturday.

"We are expecting 40 million tourists this year in our country," Erdoğan said while addressing a rally of the ruling Justice and Development (AK) Party in Turkey's holiday resort province of southern Antalya.

"We expect $32 billion tourism revenue, and we are proceeding quickly towards this target," he added.

The president said the number of tourists coming to Antalya increased by 57 percent, reaching 10.5 million, in 2017.

"Our target for this year is 14 million," he added.

While Turkey hosted 36.8 million foreigners in 2014 and 36.3 million in 2015, the figure decreased sharply to 25.3 million in 2016 but rose again to 32.4 million last year, according to the Turkish Statistical Institute.

Turkey welcomed 3 million foreign visitors in the first two months of 2018 during its winter period, according to the Culture and Tourism Ministry.