New categories for calculating foreign visitors

Until now the calculating foreign visitors to Georgia was very vague-no distinctions were made between various types of visitors. According to the Ministry of Interior Affairs, visitors to Georgia will now be divided into three categories. Tourists are foreign citizens who enter Georgia and stay in the country no less than 24 hours and no more than a year. People in transit are individuals who enter the country, stay no more than 24 hours and move to a third country. The third category of visitors are residents of bordering countries who often cross the Georgian border for entrepreneurial, trade or other reasons and stay in the country less than 24 hours.

Altogether in 2012 the Georgian border was crossed by 4,389,256 visitors. According to the new calculations in 2012 there were 1,789,592 tourists, 754,938 in individuals in transit and 1,844,726 other.