After the end of the period that would have been known as the tourist season without the pandemic, the time has come to draw the line and add up the losses. Globally, tourism, as an economic branch, has suffered significant losses, and in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Mostar and Medjugorje are among the most affected – whose constant development was abruptly interrupted.
The season was somewhat saved by Neum, but statistics and predictions for the future are not optimistic. The Federal Bureau of Statistics announced that in the area of this entity, there was a decline in the number of tourists in August by 74 percent.
The Tourist Board of the Herzegovina-Neretva Canton (HNK), which has a large number of popular tourist destinations, says that the drop in visits to Neum was low, however, visits to Medjugorje and Mostar in the two summer months were 90 to 95 percent lower.
Semir Temim from the HNK Tourist Board stated that as of September 1, the sojourn tax is paid to the tourist board again on the basis of the so-called corona law, BHRT writes.
”However, we are witnessing what September was like, and the next period will be the same because we see that the pandemic is gaining momentum, the countries are closed, the borders are closing, so we do not expect a large inflow of those funds. During the summer months, the HNK Assembly unsuccessfully appealed to the BiH Council of Ministers to withdraw the decision to close the borders to EU citizens, bearing in mind the possibility of generating some kind of income from tourism,” Temim concluded.
