A 2 pct hike on the year was experienced in hotel guest numbers in 2009 by the Abu Dhabi Tourism Authority (ADTA), thus raising international trends.

Sunday, the ADTA specified that for the year 2009, nearly 1.54 million guests stayed in hotels throughout the emirate. A hike by 16 per cent year on year was seen in guest stays in the final quarter.

"While the last 12 months have been challenging, as they have for all destinations, we believe growth is a very solid performance in the face of global decline," said ADTA Director-General Mubarak Al Muhairi.

A very vital contribution was played by strong growth in domestic demand, to Abu Dhabi's ability to fight with the tourism industry challenges which occurred mainly due to the global financial crisis and the spread of H1N1.

While in 2004, the guest arrivals in Abu Dhabi were 960,000, it hiked to over 1.5 million in 2009.

Britain, the United States, India, Germany, Egypt, France, Saudi Arabia and Italy were the Abu Dhabi's main source markets for hotel guests last year.

The hike in Dhabi's hotel/hotel apartment room capacity also helped the 2009 growth. Hotel apartment room capacity climbed from 12,800 at the beginning of the year to 17,500 at the year-end.

Now, ADTA is focusing on 1.65 million hotel guests for 2010 and expects that a noteworthy role in achieving the target would be played by the leisure tourism segment.

In other developments, the full year traffic figures for Abu Dhabi International Airport were unveiled by the Abu Dhabi Airports Company (Adac). The figures specified that the passenger numbers hiked 7.3 per cent on year to 9.7 million last year.