PHILIPSBURG--Cruise tourism in St. Maarten saw an 11.1 percent increase in passenger arrivals during the first quarter of 2025 compared to the same period in 2024, the government’s Department of Statistics STAT has announced.
Preliminary figures released by STAT show that 635,968 cruise passengers arrived between January and March this year, up from 572,474 in 2024 – a rise of 63,494 passengers.
The data reflects continued growth in the cruise sector, which has been rebounding since the global travel disruptions in recent years.
In addition to reporting on cruise arrivals, STAT, in a press release on Tuesday, addressed ongoing changes in how stay-over arrival data is collected and reported. In November 2024, the Immigration and Border Protection Services (IBPS) implemented a new processing system designed to improve data reliability. The system was developed in partnership with the Princess Juliana International Airport (PJIA) and STAT.
The new system minimises manual data entry and reduces human error, ensuring that traveller classifications are automatically and consistently recorded, STAT said.
As a result of this transition, STAT said 2025 has been designated as the new baseline year for tracking air visitor arrivals. The updated methodology now excludes resident travellers from arrival counts, improving data precision but complicating direct comparisons with past years.
STAT said it has adjusted 2024 arrival data from PJIA as a point of comparison. Because PJIA’s system does not distinguish between resident and non-resident travellers, STAT applied a 10% reduction to the 2024 figures to estimate non-resident arrivals.
STAT said this adjustment is based on historical data from the Immigration Office.
“While the methodologies differ, the adjusted 2024 estimate provides a reasonable basis for an approximate comparison. Without applying such assumptions, it would not be possible to report growth figures or year-over-year percentage changes; only the total number of visitor arrivals for 2025 could be presented, with no contextual benchmark to assess change,” it was stated in the press release.
