by admin | May 25, 2021 | Business, Large Enterprise, World
Kolkata : Sri Lanka is betting big on Indian visitors as the island nation is expecting a 20 per cent growth in arrival of travellers to 2.4 million in the current year, an official said on Tuesday.
“Last year, about two million international visitors travelled to Sri Lanka and we expect it to reach 2.4 million this year. Of two million visitors, there were over three lakh Indians,” Sri Lanka Convention Bureau’s Chairman Kumar De Silva said on the sidelines of an interactive session organised by MCCI.
According to him, India is the largest source market for tourists for Sri Lanka.
Of the total visitors, about 90 per cent were tourists and the rest was for other purposes including business engagements, he said, adding that the country was also focusing at travellers for business meetings.
There is growing cooperation between two neighbouring countries and the target markets for Meeting, Incentive, Conference and Exhibition (MICE) are cities close to Sri Lanka, said De Silva.
Sri Lankan Airlines’ Country Manager Lalit Peiris said the carrier operates 122 direct flights per week from 14 Indian cities to Colombo though the airline has no plan, at present, to expand it in India.
However, from Kolkata, during the festive season of Durga Puja, the carrier proposes to increase to four flights per week against three flights a week during the rest of the year.
De Silva said tourism has been one of the top foreign exchange earners for the country and it could become the largest in years to come.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Interviews
Trivendra Singh Rawat
By Rajnish Singh,
Dehradun : As Uttarakhand hosts the fourth International Yoga Day on Thursday, Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat feels that the event may help attract more tourists to the state, creating more job and business opportunities.
The reason Rawat thinks the yoga day will boost tourism is because of the presence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the mega event which he reasons was watched by people across the world.
“Hosting the main International Yoga Day event undoubtedly gave a new identity to Uttarakhand as 193 countries watched it.
“As Prime Minister Modi himself participated in the event, Uttarakhand will get a world class platform. It would really attract domestic as well as foreign tourists,” Rawat told IANS.
If tourism gets a boost, it will help in creating new jobs and business opportunities in the state.
“If everything goes well as we are expecting, Uttarakhand will get a new direction. The door to employment will open for youths.”
The Chief Minister said over three crore tourists, including 18 lakh foreigners, visit Uttarakhand every year. If the number increases, the state will earn more revenue.
Rawat said the attraction of foreign tourists towards Uttarakhand is mainly because it is famous as an yoga centre of India. After this event, the state’s fame will “definitely increase”.
He said more than 35 volunteers of foreign countries participated in this event and did yoga ‘asanas’ along with nearly 50,000 people in the sprawling lawn of Dehradun’s Forest Research Institute (FRI).
Over 45,000 people did yoga postures on mats while around 5,000 people, including security forces, witnessed the event.
“The successful hosting of the mega event would have surely sent a message to others watching the function in other countries. They would surely want to learn the yoga technique and visit Uttarakhand,” Rawat added.
Rawat on Wednesday wrote a blog thanking the Prime Minister for selecting the state capital as the host of the main event on International Yoga Day.
The tourism sector in Uttarakhand suffered badly in the aftermath of the 2013 devastating flash floods in the hills.
Officials in Uttarakhand administration said domestic tourist footfall in the state after the 2013 disaster fell by over 25 per cent while it went down by over 20 per cent in terms of foreign tourism.
Tourism has again picked up, and officials expect the International Yoga Day to give it a further boost.
(Rajnish Singh can be contacted at rajnish.s@ians.in)
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Business, Corporate, Corporate Governance, Emerging Businesses, Muslim World
Khartoum : Sudanese Minister of Tourism, Antiquities and Wildlife Dr. Mohamed Abu-Zaid met with Moroccan State Secretary for Tourism Lamia Boutaleb on the sidelines of the 108th Session of the Executive Council of the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), held in San Sebastian, Spain, on May 23-25.
During the meeting, the two sides discussed ways of enhancing tourism and joint cooperation between Sudan and Morocco. They also reviewed the preparations for holding the meetings of the Joint Sudanese-Moroccan High Ministerial Committee in Khartoum in October.
In a statement to Sudan News Agency (SUNA), Abu-Zaid said his meeting with Ms. Boutaleb focused on the importance of Sudan’s taking advantage of Moroccan experiences in traditional industries, as well as enhancing tourism destinations in the two countries through communication with the European international promotion companies.
—AB/UNA-OIC
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Corporate, Corporate Governance, Interviews
Union Tourism Minister K.J. Alphons
By Sarwar Kashani,
New Delhi : International travel advisories against India are “hugely biased” and “uncalled for” because crime and violent incidents in the country are only “few and far between”, says Union Tourism Minister K.J. Alphons.
In an interview with IANS at his office, the minister asserted India was a “perfectly safe” tourist destination for foreigners and the government was making efforts to get negative advisories against the country removed.
“Most of these advisories are hugely biased. I don’t want to use the word racially biased. Like the advisory for Assam is still on Level 2. Why? Such advisories are completely uncalled for,” he said.
Alphons said the External Affairs Ministry had been taking up the issue with various countries and of course Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s global diplomacy was the “best message” that painted India as a safe place.
“You know incidents are deplorable but they are so few and far between. The issue is that the (foreign) media is hugely biased (against India).”
The remarks came against the backdrop of the US and other western countries repeatedly asking their citizens to exercise caution in their travels India due to reported incidents of crime and violence.
The US in January reviewed its advisories placing India on Level 2 and suggesting increased caution. Canada also issued its updated travel advisory on March 21 asking citizens to “exercise a high degree of caution in India due to a continuing threat of terrorist attacks throughout the country at all times”.
The UK in its February 21, 2018, dated advisory suggested a high degree of caution as “terrorists are very likely to try to carry out attacks in India” and asked the British to “be vigilant” in the wake of “an increased threat to places visited by British nationals such as religious sites, markets, festival venues and beaches”.
Alphons sad India has established itself as “a perfect destination, a perfectly safe destination” and despite these advisories the country hosted 10.2 million foreign tourists in 2017, which is an increase of 15.8 per cent from the previous year.
The receipts of these foreign tourists was $27 billion – an increase of 20.2 per cent in terms of revenue.
“So, I say with a firm belief that these advisories are completely uncalled for.”
(Sarwar Kashani can be contacted at sarwar.k@ians.in)
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Corporate, Corporate Governance, Economy, News, Politics
Vijai Sardesai
Panaji : Goa as a tourism destination should become so expensive that low-budget Indian tourists are discouraged from coming to the coastal state, a minister said on Friday.
Town and Country Planning Minister Vijai Sardesai also said Goa should re-orient its tourism to attract high-end tourists and focus on quality tourism rather than a tourism apparatus which focuses merely on footfalls.
He was responding to a question on overcrowding and inflow of tourists on a shoe-string budget to the coastal state during the Christmas-New Year week.
“I (had) said Goa should become so expensive for the tourists that they should say ‘I should not come to Goa. It is not worth going to Goa’. Which tourist — Indian tourist,” Sardesai said.
An opposition legislator in the last legislative assembly, Sardesai heads the regional Goa Forward party, which has three ministers in the 12-member Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar-led coalition government.
“It should also be a place which gives high-end facilities and gets high-end tourism, which benefits the sons of the soil,” he said.
Goa annually attracts more than six million tourists every year, which is four times its resident population of 1.5 million. Half a million foreign tourists also visit the coastal state every year.
The tourism rush peaks during the festive year-end week, when a bulk of domestic tourists visit the state, often putting pressure on the already inadequate public infrastructure, which Sardesai said needed to be upped.
“Today we are competing with Kerala, we are competing with Sri Lanka and mostly with South East Asia. Now South East Asia has a lot more to offer. They have got 500 golf courses, we do not have a single golf course and we still say we don’t want that,” the minister said, adding that high-end tourism-oriented facilities need to be created.
“(Need for) re-orienting tourism to get high-end and see that people who come to Goa is not just about quantity, but quality,” Sardesai said.
