Air Canada aircraft pictured at Vancouver International Airport on July 22.Fred Lum/The Globe and Mail
The number of international visits to Canada from China and India reached record levels in July, while travel between Canada and the United States declined.
According to Statistics Canada, the number of Canadians visiting the U.S. fell by 4.3 per cent compared to June, while the number of overnight trips dropped by 5.5 per cent to 1.9-million trips. The number of U.S. citizens visiting Canada also declined, though slightly, by 1.1 per cent to roughly 1.7 million.
At the same time, the monthly number of Canadians travelling overseas jumped to 888,000, the highest number since record-keeping began in 1972.
The number of international travelers also continued a gradual rise to 439,000 in July, an uptick of 1.5 per cent – led by growth from Asian travellers.
Although the United Kingdom and France were the largest source countries for visitors to Canada – with 59,000 and 43,000 visitors, respectively – Indian and Chinese travellers came in record numbers, with strong growth in travel from both Japan and South Korea.
In July, the number of visitors from China reached 40,000 for the first time, a growth of 3.5 per cent from June. The highest monthly growth figure, however, came from the subcontinent: Travel by Indian residents grew by 15.2 per cent to 18,000, the highest number of monthly visitors from India ever.
The number of South Korean travelers grew by 3.9 per cent to 15,000 and the number of Japanese visitors increased by 7 per cent to 25,000.
Meanwhile, visits from Australia dropped by 1.5 per cent to 25,000 and the number of travelers from Hong Kong fell steeply in July by 8.1 per cent to just 11,000. The number of travelers arriving from Italy and Switzerland both fell to 10,000.