Maldives facing ‘financial ruin’ and losing US$20 million a day
Sir Hugo Swire MP told fellow lawmakers the Maldives tourism industry was losing US$20 million a day since the start of the state emergency and warned of the consequences.
07 Mar 2018, 9:00 AM
The Maldives is facing financial ruin, the UK parliament heard Tuesday, as politicians debated the state of emergency in the troubled honeymoon destination.
Sir Hugo Swire MP told fellow lawmakers the tourism industry was losing $20 million a day since the start of the state emergency and warned of the consequences, citing the number of Maldivians fighting in Iraq and Syria and the easy access to jihadi websites.
“The Maldives economy remains a tourism driven economy in that it contributes more than 25 percent of the country’s GDP,” he said.
“While the tourism sector supplies more than 70 percent of the foreign exchange earnings to the country, one third of the government revenue is generated from this sector. Tourism is also known as the leading employment generator in the country. In 2016, tourism contributed 36.4 percent to the government revenue.
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