Flanders had a good year for tourism in 2023, seeing an increase in incoming tourists, with visitor numbers 6% up on 2022, according to Belgian national statistics office, Statbel. The figure is also 1% higher than pre-pandemic benchmark year 2019.

Domestic tourism up

Flanders is attracting visitors from other parts of Belgium, with domestic tourism in the northern Belgian region accounting for 6.9 million visits – 6% more than in 2019. What’s more the average length of stay was also up. This was more than reflected in the year-on-year data for the cultural economy, with museums, visitor centres, experiences and attractions bringing in 6.6% more visitors than in 2022.

Museums in particular saw a huge rise in interest of 15.9% more visitors than in 2022, partly, says the government’s tourism agency, Visit Flanders, thanks to Antwerp’s Fine Art Museum (KMSKA) opening its doors again with a showstopping exhibition of Flemish Masters, after 11 long years of refurbishment.

Overnight visits up, but international tourism has fallen

France, Germany, The Netherlands, and the UK provide the majority of Flanders’ cross-border tourists. Dutch visits were up by 16% over 2019 with visitors from the Netherlands totting up an impressive 4.1 million overnight stays in 2023. Overall however, international tourism to Flanders fell by 2%.

UK tourists made fewer trips in 2021, widely put down to the ongoing Covid-19 crisis and ensuing difficulties around travel, as well as the implementation of new Brexit rules. This now appears to be turning around, with numbers of UK visitors increasing again in 2023 and overnighters only down by 3%.

Flanders in the spotlight

According to figures from Flanders Statistical Authority dating to their last biennial report, the tourism sector is estimated to employ over 300,000 people in the region and brought in 9.5 billion euros in 2022 (that’s 2.6 per cent of total gross value added to the economy). The latest figures, including 2023’s, will be crunched and published later this year.

Meanwhile, Tourism minister Zuhal Demir is anticipating those as cause for celebration. “It gives me particular pleasure that tourism in Flanders is clearly back on top after a dark period,” she said in a statement. 

“We have continued to work very hard with Visit Flanders in recent years to keep Flanders in the spotlight as a destination, even during the lockdowns when travel was not really possible. It is great to see that all these efforts are paying off.”