France holds off Spain as world's tourist favourite

PARIS - Olympic host France retained its spot as the world's top tourist destination in 2024 with 100 million visitors, holding off stiff competition from countries including Spain.

As world tourism returned to pre-pandemic levels with 1.4 billion people taking a trip abroad, according to the UN, both France and Spain announced record visitor numbers.

"While France is still the world leader in this sector, we are facing fierce competition, particularly from Spain," said French Tourism Minister Nathalie Delattre in an interview on Tuesday with the daily Le Figaro.

Spain said last week that a record 94 million foreign tourists flocked to the Iberian nation in 2024, a 10 percent increase from the previous year.

France, which hosted the Olympic Games in July - September 2024, welcomed two more million visitors in 2024, an increase of two percent compared with 2023.

But although France had more visitors, they spent less than those in Spain -- 71 billion euros ($74-billion) compared with 126 billion euros in Spain.

"We need to work to increase the average each visitor spends and get our visitors to stay longer," Delattre said.

France's takings from international tourists rose by a total of 12 percent year-on-year, driven largely by Belgian, English, German, Swiss and US citizens, the tourism ministry said in a statement.

Overnight stays by US tourists rose by five percent, the ministry added, calling the Americans "a key clientele" with strong purchasing power.

Despite the return of customers from Asia, the number of Chinese visitors to France remained 60 percent lower than before the pandemic.

Thirty percent fewer Japanese visited the country than in 2019.

Good snowfall in late 2024 meanwhile drove a rebound for the end-of-year holidays as snow sports lovers flocked to the French ski slopes."The outlook for the first quarter of 2025 is very good, with visitor numbers on the rise," the ministry statement added. France holds off Spain as world's tourist favourite

Read More........→January 27, 2025

First Ever Cheese Museum Opens in Paris: ‘It’s Gouda Brie a Delicious Visit’

A display case at the Museum of Cheese in Paris – credit, Musee du Fromage, released to the media

Fromage, Formaggio, Käse, Queso: cheese—one of the Old World’s great romance stories.

In the heart of Paris, a new museum has opened dedicated to the ages-old craft of cheesemaking in France, the second most prolific producer on the continent (behind Italy).

At the newly-opened Musee du Fromage, visitors can learn about the history of cheese making, something which may have been going on for 5,000 years. They can learn about the story of various famous French cheeses, see cheese made, talk to real cheesemakers, and yes, taste them.

The mastermind behind the museum is Pierre Brisson—who remembers Sunday afternoons at the market standing on his tippy-toes to look into the display cases of the cheesemakers and marveling at the variety.

Coming to Paris 15 years ago, he saw how developed the Parisian pride and museum scene was for the showcasing of wine, but cheese, perhaps an even more iconic French symbol, was notably absent.

“People can see cheesemaking live and also talk to the cheesemaker,” Brisson told Euronews. “We are working with many traditional farmers, so we want people [to feel like they’re] kind of traveling when they taste the cheese. We are opening a little window in the heart of Paris to the rural side of France.”

The French have invented some of the world’s most beloved cheeses and just to name the headliners, there’s Camembert, Brie, Epoisses du Bourgogne, Roquefort, Ossau Irati, Comte, La Tur, and so many others that French readers are no doubt hollering to be included here.

“[The process] depends on so many things, even the humor of the animals whose milk is being used,” Agathe de Saint-Exupéry, one of the experts at the museum, tells the Guardian. “You can make the same good cheese every day, and every day it will taste different. It just cannot be done industrially.”

Cheesemaking is a good profession in France that makes a better living than other rural activities. Even so, Brisson knows firsthand it’s a productive, sometimes grueling job that is currently experiencing a labor shortage.

Like many nations, there is a continuous movement in France from the countryside to the cities, and Brisson hopes the museum will help people connect with their countryside heritage—and understand its value and what it contributes to French life even in the cities.

“Now, we are able to know, thanks to science, a lot of things about cheese. But our ancestors, they didn’t know all these details, but they still could make amazing cheese and develop very amazing skills of cheesemaking. So there is a know-how that’s developed for centuries that we kind of inherited today. We have a responsibility to keep this alive and to continue to pass to new generations the passion.”First Ever Cheese Museum Opens in Paris: ‘It’s Gouda Brie a Delicious Visit’

Read More........→December 09, 2024