Kuban lost a fifth of its tourists amid fuel oil spill in the Black Sea

Demand for vacations in Krasnodar Krai has decreased by 21% compared to last year, while among the cities of Kuban, against the backdrop of the fuel oil spill, tourists have shown interest in Yeysk, located on the coast of the Sea of Azov. At the same time, Anapa has lost ground in the rating of popular resorts, but has not lost vacationers.

"Kavkazsky Uzel" wrote that from July 25 to August 12, the authorities did not record new fuel oil emissions on the coast of Anapa, although volunteers during this period stated that emissions were continuing. On August 4, the volunteer headquarters confirmed that local emissions of oil products continue on the beaches of Taman, and pollution is also visible on satellite images. Scientists from the Subtropical Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences reported a normalization of the concentration of oil products near Vityazevo, but noted a change in the chemical composition of macroalgae and the impact of fuel oil on the mussel population.

The environmental disaster that occurred in the Black Sea near Anapa had a key impact on the decline in demand for vacations within Russia. Krasnodar Krai has lost 21% in terms of both the number of bookings and demand compared to last year, said Ilya Umansky, President of the Russian Union of Travel Industry.

According to him, other factors also contributed to the drop in demand - the strengthening of the ruble, which increased the attractiveness of foreign trips, coupled with inflation and high deposit rates. "A large amount of money has been recorded in deposits of individuals, and withdrawing these funds with the loss of interest for the sake of, for example, a tourist trip is no longer so attractive. And another category of people who, on the contrary, used loans in previous years to go on a trip, have lost this opportunity, since loans are now extremely expensive," his words are quoted on the RST website.

"It all depends on the summer, everyone has loans, mortgages. What to do in the winter? We have no work at this time. I was hoping since May, but now everything is gone, [there is] no hope left," Kedr Media quotes a woman selling clothes and accessories for summer recreation in one of the tents on Pionersky Prospekt as saying.

Her neighbor, selling souvenirs, is more optimistic, noting that by the end of July there were more people. "I used to sit here watching movies all day, and now at least I started working. They started to remove the nets and the ramparts, so it seems like people started coming,” she believes.

Despite the environmental situation and beaches closed for swimming, Anapa is still one of the top five vacation spots in the Krasnodar Territory, although it has dropped from second to fourth place compared to 2024, noted Sergei Romashkin, Vice President of the Association of Tour Operators of Russia. A 20–30% price reduction for accommodation in hotels with swimming pools, which could replace the sea, did not solve the problem — the resort lost a significant portion of tourists, according to an RBC article from

Against the backdrop of the fuel oil spill, interest arose in vacationing in Yeysk, a small resort on the Sea of Azov in the north of the Krasnodar Territory. In 2024, about 577 thousand tourists visited the entire Yeysk region in a year. This year, Yeysk entered the top ten most popular resorts for the first time Krasnodar Krai, where hotels were most often booked, RBK quoted the director of the Association of Travel Aggregators (ATAG) Alexander Bragin as saying. Last year, this resort, according to the Ostrovok hotel booking service, was in 13th place, Bragin added.

This summer, Yeysk took third place after Sochi and Gelendzhik in terms of booking accommodation in Kuban for the Sutochno.ru service, Airat Musin, the platform's marketing director, told the publication. In the summer of 2024, Anapa occupied this position, but this year, Sutochno.ru did not even make it into the top 5 most popular resorts in Krasnodar Krai. The number of bookings for accommodation in Yeysk has increased by 60% compared to last year, Musin notes.

Yeisk is not a trend, but a temporary replacement. And if you do not start working seriously, it will remain in the memory of tourists as a city where it was cheap — and once was enough, activist Alexander Korovayny is sure.

"There is fuel oil on the Black Sea, so some tourists decided to come to us instead of Anapa. A tourist arrives — the sea, the sun, merchant facades, a Cossack atmosphere. The first two days — delight. And then — overflowing garbage containers, water shortages, power outages. You can't turn on a hair dryer, an iron is a luxury, a shower — on schedule. The city is not ready to become a tourist Mecca. The infrastructure is in ruins. For Yeysk to become a real resort, systematic investments are needed. "Not patching holes, but a full-fledged strategy," he wrote on August 15 in his Telegram channel.

On December 15, 2024, two tankers carrying fuel oil sank in the Kerch Strait, which led to catastrophic environmental consequences. Details can be found in the "Caucasian Knot" reference "Fuel oil spill in the Kerch Strait". Materials about the consequences of the fuel oil spill have been collected by the "Caucasian Knot" on the thematic page "Eco-disaster in Kuban".

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