Tourism experts warn that days of double digit growth in the tourist industry are gone, as the explosive growth seen in recent years was simply abnormal and unviable long term.

In July last year Croatia recorded a 10.5 percent rise in tourist arrivals compared to the same month in 2016. But this July Croatia had roughly the same number of tourists as in July 2017, and the same unchanged numbers are expected in August, Vecernji List daily reported on Thursday.

On the annual level, Croatia posted record highs in 2017, with 18.5 million tourists, or 13 percent up from 2016, and 102 million overnight stays, or 12 percent up from 2016. But tourist industry experts now warn that double-digit growth seen in recent times is about to end.

CEO of the Uniline tourist company, Boris Zgomba, said that although during the this year’s tourist season some small growth has been observed, it stopped in July as numbers in that month remained unchanged from last year. He added that, according to data collected so far, August is set to be unchanged or slightly up by 1-2 percent from August 2017.

“This tells us that over the two main tourist months of the year the hyper-demand we have witnessed in recent years, when we had two or three requests for every single bed, is gone. That kind of huge demand is simply not viable in the long term,” Zgomba said.

He added that Croatia’s tourist industry has now reached a new phase, in which the country has to fight for every single visitor.

Asked whether lower demand is a result of high prices, Zgomba said that setting prices is a discretionary right of all businesses, but that those companies who had hiked up prices when the market was booming have promptly reacted this year when they felt that the demand is lower.

Follow N1 via mobile apps for Android | iPhone/iPad | Windows| and social media on Twitter | Facebook.