On 4 August, Georgia’s Economy Minister Natia Turnava confirmed that the first international tourists arrived in the country.

In addition, she spoke of the upcoming flights into the country. “We've partially opened regular flights in August. German airline Lufthansa is performing flights, the first flight of Air France will be carried out on August 9 and tomorrow the first flight of Airbaltic will be performed on the route Riga-Tbilisi-Riga. In addition, Airzena operates commercial charters, with up to 16 commercial charters scheduled for the month,” she said.

The flag carrier airline of Greece, Aegean Airlines also announced that it would carry out one flight between the Georgian capital city of Tbilisi and Greek capital city of Athens in August. Turnava said that Georgia would also resume flights with Greece, but flight confirmation has not been issued yet. “Business interest must be balanced with the epidemiological interests of the population of our country. Therefore, we are still making the final decision,” she said in that regard.

The head of the Georgian National Tourism Administration Mariam Kvrivishvili said that on 3 August about 188 passengers arrived from Munich to Tbilisi and another 188 from Paris to Tbilisi arrived and that they are now traveling in Georgia without first going through a 14-day quarantine. 

Despite the positive news for Georgia’s tourism sector, the head of the National Bank of the country Koba Gvenetadze told the media that the volume of tourism revenues in 2020 in Georgia compared to the previous year will be 80% lower. His prognosis was followed from the consideration that for the remaining few months of this year, tourism revenues will be at a minimum level.

In addition with the resumption of international tourism, the Georgian government also started the third phase of the anti-crisis plan in order to ease the burden caused by the coronavirus crisis. This phase of the plan envisages: 1) the coverage of utility fees; 2) a one-time assistance to the Georgian families of 200 lari per child; 3) an assistance programme for the self-employed and 4) a full tuition for one semester of the 2020-2021 academic year for Georgian students.

In the past 24 hours the country reported 9 new cases of Covid-19 infection of which 7 were imported to Georgia. The current tally stands at 1206 with 17 reported deaths.