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May 9 - The Middle East’s premier travel and tourism event, the Arabian Travel Market, finished its 17th year yesterday, opening its doors to the public as it does every year on the last day. Consumer’s Day gives the public a chance to take part in fun competitions, take advantage of a variety of special offers, and experience hundreds of destinations. Turkish Airways, the world’s fastest growing airline, used…
May 9 - Tourists are flocking to Gharbia to see a nilotic fish farm developed by Bakhit bin Suqan Al Mansouri. The ‘nilotic’ fish farm, which has freshwater fish like Tilapia and Catfish, made headlines after major websites like Google Earth featured it. Al Mansouri is the first UAE citizen to establish a farm for Nilotic fishes in Liwa. He said the idea occurred to him one day in 1995 as he was going about his…
May 9 - Hotels in Ajman have reasonably decent levels of occupancy given that it is easy to go to Ajman from Sharjah and Abu Dhabi, said an executive for an Ajman-based hotel at the last day of the Arabian Travel Market (ATM). "All hotels in Ajman are very happy because of the recent international sports events in neighbouring Sharjah, which provided good business and during the last two months overbooked…
May 9 - The Cyprus Government has signed an agreement with Qatari Diar Real Estate Investment Company to invest Dh551 million in a real estate venture that includes a five-star hotel, luxury apartments, retail space and office buildings, said officials on Saturday. This development will take place in Cyprus’ capital Nicosia and both countries will be equal stakeholders in the project."This major tourism…
May 9 - Given that UAE has become of one of the tourist destinations of choice, other Gulf states are inclined to follow a similar model and promote tourism in their countries. In this regard, Oman is looking to diversify its economy with the help of tourism. "The government decided to develop tourism and diversify the economy by not letting just the oil play the 100 per cent role," Salim Bin Adey Al Mamari,…
May 8- The Arabian Travel Market (ATM) 2010 closed today, reflecting renewed strength and optimism from the travel and tourism industry. The event closed on a high note this Friday showing the industry has built up momentum for growth. The number of visitors to the four day event increased by 3 percent compared to last year, and there was also an increase in the number of Gulf Cooperation Council…
May 5 - Around 500 Umrah visas have been issued for Iranian pilgrims, said Saud Al-Sulimani, customer relations manager at Bab Al-Umrah, one of five Umrah service providers in Jeddah. He said the first batch of pilgrims should arrive in Makkah in a few days. This news is encouraging for Umrah service providers and related businesses who have been running into losses since pilgrims were Iran have not been coming…
May 5 -According to a survey conducted by the Insignia Travel Intelligence Report, 71 per cent people (out of 2,000 respondents) still think that Dubai is the ultimate luxury destination, thus keeping in line with its ‘seven-star’ tourist hub. In this regard, more than 90 per cent of the respondents feel that news regarding the finances of entities such as Dubai World has had no effect on the bookings, said…
May 4- The Egyptian Tourist Authority (ETA) on Monday announced the launch of its Dh18.3 million ($5 million) promotional campaign called "Egypt: The Beginning of the Tale" to bring in more Arab tourists to the region. This is largely because the number of visitors to Egypt went down by 2.4 per cent in 2009 given the recession, said Amr El Ezabi, Chairman of ETA."We went from 12.8 million visitors in 2008 to 12.5…
May 4 - As the Next Move was launched last week, Al Futtaim Group unveiled two new phases of the Cairo Festival City -- Festival Living and the Business District. Spanning over three million square meters in New Cairo, the Festival City will be a mixture of residential and commercial districts. Festival Living will occupy 130,000 square meters of land with several apartment buildings, four to seven floors and…
May 4- Syria and Georgia signed an agreement on Sunday for tourism exchange and cooperation. The agreement includes tourist data, experiences, systems and legislations exchange in addition to encouraging tourism investments and easing of travel between the two countries. The agreement was signed by Minister of Tourism Saadallah Agha al-Qalaa and Georgian Foreign Minister Grigol Vashadze. Al-Qalaa said that the…
May 4 - The worldwide recession that led to the global financial meltdown last year slowly seems to be dissipating and the travel industry is on the road to recovery, particularly the GCC market, said Mark Walsh, Group Exhibition Director, Reed Travel Exhibitions, organiser of Arabian Travel Market (ATM) 2010, slated to open today. The exhibition is taking place at Dubai International Convention and Exhibition…
May 4 - The Arabian Travel Market starts today at the Dubai International Convention and Exhibition Centre (DICEC). Speaking at a press conference yesterday, the Director of Reed Travel Exhibitions, Mark Walsh, said that the tourism sector is on the road to recovery given the interest from industry buyers and suppliers. Even though the exhibitor numbers and space remains unchanged this year -- about 2,100…
May 3 - The Abu Dhabi Tourism Authority (ADTA) and Abu Dhabi National Exhibitions Company (ADNEC) have joined hands to launch a number of events in the UAE capital. "There is an insatiable demand for a multi-purpose events arena of this calibre to meet the interest previously shown by event organisers," said Ahmed Hussein, Deputy Director General, ADTA. "Abu Dhabi Hall gives us the leverage we need to attract…
May 3 - Tourist traffic to Petra went up in the first quarter of 2010, said official figures released on Saturday. According to the Petra Development and Tourism Region Authority (PDTRA), 321,000 tourists visited the ancient Nabataean city in the January-April period as compared to the same period last year, thus going up by 44 per cent. Tourist traffic was highest in April when 111,834 tourists visited Petra,…
May 2 - Dubai’s Department of Tourism and Commerce Marketing (DTCM) stand at the 17th edition of the Arabian Travel Market will be bigger this year, measuring 1225 square meters with 87 booths and 114 co-participants. Last year’s the DTCM stand measured 1125 square meters and there were 105 co-participants. The ATM is taking place at the Dubai International Convention and Exhibition Center (DICEC) from May…
May 2- Omar Ahmed Al Bitar, UAE ambassador to China, opened the UAE pavilion at Expo Shanghai 2010 yesterday. Attending the opening ceremony were Deputy Commissioner General Abdulla Aidaroos, Deputy Director General of MNC and Commissioner General of the UAE pavilion Salim Saeed Al Ameri, and a number of other senior officials. The UAE pavilion, which took several years to plan and development, occupies 6,000…
May 1- Jordan’s tourism sector registered an increase in the first quarter of 2010, said the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities this week. Overnight tourist numbers have gone up by 33.4 per cent during the first quarter to 883,450 people from a total of 662,075 in the same period of 2009. Same day visitors were up 17.6 per cent to 651,325 people from 553,929 in 2009. The Ministry said overall numbers in the…
