Malta's decline in tourism

I was looking at a few articles on the Times of Malta website today, as I try to keep in touch with what is going on in Malta and about the general current affairs.

From what I read today, and yesterday, I think I can come up with a few reasons with regarding the decrease of tourists to Malta.

The most obvious reason seems to be the recession that most of Europe is going through. Everywhere I go, people seem to be struggling to make ends meets. Even here in the UK, I came across an article which says that families are eating food even after they're expired, as well as keeping left overs in the fridge for a longer time period. Needless to say, this is happening in several other countries, even in Malta.

This brings me to the next point, which is: foreigners cannot afford to travel as much as they used to, or their budget is less than it was a few years ago. Even though Malta, in comparison to other European countries is rather cheap to live in (food, accomodation, transport), the flights to Malta are alarmingly expensive. I think this is a disadvantage which cannot be overlooked. Furthermore, since to my knowledge shops do not need to have items tagged with a price by law, some shop owners tend to take advantage of tourists. This is due to the fact that tourists would not know how much they are expected to pay for a bottle of water for instance. I have seen this happening with my own eyes, and in the past it also happened to me, even though I am local.

In a way, I am glad that less tourists are visiting Malta, because most of Malta is going through roadworks. Too many main-roads are closed down because  of this, and traffic is alarmingly worse. It is bad enough when there are no road works! I think roadworks are very repulsive, and closing down such roads during summer, which in Malta is the highest tourist peak is more or less insane. Having said that, I would also like to mention that such work on the roads creates an increase in probability when it comes to trafffic accidents. Traffic accidents involving tourists will only give Malta a bad name.

Having said all the above, I still think that Malta is a great holiday destination, especially during summer time, when the weather is pefect for the beach, when nightlife is at its best... And who can forget those marvellous historical places and the delicious food?