This year the traffic of cruise passengers in Italian ports will be of almost 13 million passengers, with an increment of +37.6% compared to 2022. This is foreseen by the maritime agency Cemar Agency Network highlighting that the 2023 figure will represent the new historical record for Italy which, having filed the pandemic, has resumed growing at a rapid pace. "We have received and analyzed - explained the president of the agency Sergio Senesi in on the occasion of the Seatrade Cruise Global exhibition in progress at Fort Lauderdale - strong signs of growth, especially for as regards the number of passengers handled in ports Italians compared to ship touches».

According to the forecasts of Cemar Agency Network, in fact, at the By the end of 2023, about 12,800,000 passengers will be handled in the ports of the Peninsula (+37.6% compared to 2022 and +9.2% compared to to 2019 which was the last pre-pandemic season). Ship touches will instead be slightly lower than those recorded in 2022: 4,915 against 4,955 in the previous year. Finally, there will be 168 cruise ships in transit in Italian waters representing of 52 shipping companies.

It is expected that this year the Italian ports involved in the Cruise traffic will be 72. The primacy of Civitavecchia (2.8 million passengers), followed by Genoa (1.4 million) and Naples (1.4 million). Among the top ten, Savona, La Spezia, Palermo, Messina, Livorno, Venice and Trieste.

With regard to cruise traffic on a regional basis, Liguria (3.2 million passengers) will be confirmed first in Ranking, in addition to being the region in which 83% is concentrated of the agencies that manage cruise ship ports of call in Italy, followed by Lazio (2.9 million), Campania (1.6 million) and Sicily (1.5 million).

Among the cruise companies that in 2023 will enliven the the highest number of passengers in Italian ports stands out MSC Cruises which will approach four million passengers Handled. This will be followed by Costa Cruises (2.4 million), Royal Caribbean (1.2 million), Norwegian Cruise Line (1.1 million) and Celebrity Cruises (0.8 million).

The busiest months will be October (725 stopovers), September (639 stopovers), May (636 stopovers) and August (625 stopovers). The busiest day will be Saturday 14 October, with 32 ships moored in Italian ports and over 69,000 Passengers handled in a single day.

Based on the first evaluations carried out by Cemar Agency Network, growth will continue in 2024, when - According to the company - passengers handled in Italian ports They will certainly exceed 13 million.