The number of passengers travelling via the Beirut International Airport (BIA) rose by 23.53% y-o-y in the first quarter of 2023 to 1,363,669, up from 1,103,928 passengers in the same period last year. This rebound in the number of passengers was in part assisted by the historic depreciation of the Lebanese pound against the US Dollar which makes Lebanon an attractive destination for tourists and for the Lebanese diaspora. More specifically, the number of arriving travelers rose by 25.13% y-o-y to 644,095 and the number of departing travelers increased by 22.99% to 716,756 while the number of transit travelers fell by 55.98% to 2,818. Concurrently, the number of flights saw a sharp rebound (19.94% on a yearly basis) to 12,307. It is worth highlighting in this context that the share of Middle East Airlines (MEA) rose from 36.82% of total flights during the first quarter of 2022 to 44.87% in the first quarter of 2023. This is further sketched in the table below: