Cyprus ship traffic down in 2008

Shipping traffic in Cyprus fell in 2008 according to the latest statistics from the annual Transport Statistics report.
During 2008, 4,052 vessels arrived at the various ports of Republic of Cyprus controlled southern part of Cyprus compared with 4,279 in 2007.
Of these, 2,971 or 73.3% arrived at Limassol port, 775 or 19.1% called at Larnaca and 306 ships arrived at other ports.
On a more positive note, the number of ships on the Cyprus Register showed an increase.
At the end of 2008, there were 1,869 ships on the register with a total of 21,626,432 gross registered tonnage, compared with 1,789 ships in 2007, with a total of 20,196,441 gross registered tonnage.
Civil aircraft landings during 2008 increased to 31,755 compared with 31,028 in 2007. Passenger arrivals through airports increased to 3,625,851 in 2008, compared with 3,512,672 in 2007.
The report shows that the number of newly motor vehicles registered in 2008 increased by 5.2% to 67,722. Private saloon cars increased by 2.0% to 49,100.
At the end of 2008 vehicles of all types and categories on the register of the Land Transport Department totalled 720,749 in a population of 789,300, compared with 688,532 at the end of 2007.
There was an improvement in Cyprus’s poor road accident record. The number of road accidents reported to the police decreased to 2,131 in 2008 compared with 2,302 in 2007.
There was 82 deaths by road accidents and 1,963 injured in 2008, as against 89 dead and 2,155 injured in 2007.
By value the latest data show that the broad transport, storage and communication sector increased rose by 16.9% in 2007 in gross output, current price terms and amounted to CYP 1,275.9 mln (EUR 2,180.0 mln), compared with CYP 1,091.6 mln (EUR 1,865.1 mln) in 2006.
In value added terms, the sector increased to CYP 705.4 mln (EUR 1,205.2 mln) in 2007, from CYP 615.0 mn (EUR 1,050.8 mln) in 2006 and its share of GDP at current market prices was 7.4%.