The flow of tourists to Cape Verde grew by 11.5% in 2007. The National Statistics Institute (INE) has just released data from its Guest Traffic Inquiry, which shows that 312,880 people entered the country's hotel establishments over the course of the entire year, as opposed to 280,582 throughout 2006.

According to the inquiry, hotels responded for the majority of this flow, with 77.6% of total entries and 85.2% of nights spent in lodging establishments.

Beds and breakfasts and boarding houses together respond for 13.9% of all entries and 8.2% of nights spent in lodging establishments.

The annual inventory carried out by the INE also reveals that the growth in the number of hotel establishments in 2007 was of 6% in comparison to 2006, with the total number of hotels and lodging establishments going from 142 to 150.

The establishments offered a total of 5,368 rooms, 9,767 beds and 11,544 places.

The island of Sal remains the country's main tourist destination, with 61.4% of all hotel entries, followed by Santiago, with 19.4%, and São Vicente, with 7%.

The number of nights spent in hotel establishments shows a similar trend - 76.9% on Sal, 9.3% on Santiago and 4.9% on São Vicente.

Cape Verdeans respond for 8.7% of nights spent in hotels. Italian tourists made up 21.3% of the total of nights spent in hotels, Portuguese tourists 16.2% and Germans 10.8%.

Tourists hailing from the United Kingdom, who in previous years represented an average of 0.6% of total nights spent, saw their share skyrocket to 19.9% in 2007.

The island of Sal is the preferred destination of 78.2% of Italian tourists, 85.5% of German tourists and 78.1% of Portuguese tourists.

The average time spent in the country is 6.5 nights for Italian and British tourists and 5.9% for German tourists.