Tourism movement is headed towards Gulf region

The focus on the economic aspect has also become a Gulf trademark for the new millennium. There have been significant developments in the influx of travelers to the region: GCC countries have increased spending on modernizing their air fleets and upgrading airports to accommodate this trend. Many hotels and resorts have also been built as we have seen in the recent past. There has been an obvious increase in the activity of GCC tourist destination companies that are now available in every country.

Sheikh Tariq Al Qasimi, Chairman of the Sharjah Commerce and Tourism Authority, says: "We are working on encouraging Arab tourism between Arab countries. The Arab Tourism Market Exhibition of 2003 was a great opportunity to discuss and market Arab tourist destinations to visitors and exhibitors. We have of common factors like religion, habits, culture and security, not to mention lower cost facilities"

Al Qasimi adds: " Sharjah is a good example of a versatile tourist destination thanks to its different types of tourist styles: Heritage and culture, adventure due to the varied terrain of the emirate in addition to environmental as we have a wealth of natural safety zones from land to sea. We are aiming for a specific type of tourist: We don't seek numbers but rather selected visitors; quality tourists will generate more revenues than mass tourists."

Gulf countries have many opportunities, especially with those that are spending on tourism infrastructure like Bahrain, which recently spent around $2b and lifted the sector contribution of the GDP to 12%

Most of GCC delegates to the ATM agreed on the importance of seizing opportunities and special occasions. For example, Switzerland utilized the UN announcement of Mountain 2002 year to promote and market Swiss history and culture. That helped to generate $10b in revenue for the first half of 2002.

Al Qasimi also discussed many points about enhancing the speed of developing the sector and attracting more tourists, using tactics such as the single visa clearance for GCC visitors and forbidding the inflation prices for hospitality services. The average daily expenditure for the GCC tourist ranges from $90 in Thailand to $300 in Switzerland. I believe that anything between these figures would be reasonable for this region.

According to Al Qasimi "The tourism sector is expanding dramatically worldwide. It was an industry that generated $2b with 25 million tourists in 1950. It reached the $300b mark with more that 600 million tourists in the year 2000."

Al Qasimi expressed his happiness with the first tourism authority initiative, especially Saudi Arabia's prominent role in the last ATM. The Kingdom has many opportunities at hand that can be used with an active market role- particularly that the Saudi tourist spends $3b per annum on outbound tourism.

The war in Iraq has created many problems and posed new questions about the future of the tourism map, but Al Qasimi says: "It's too early to judge. But Kuwait which is the first GCC country to pay attention to its tourism sector in the Seventies, will witness improvement. The trial of a festival this coming February will be a good measurement of Kuwait's ability to encourage tourism."

Sheikh Tariq Al Qasimi expects an increase by 15-25% of visitors within the Gulf region for this for this summer season, with around 80% of tourists coming from Gulf countries. This number is compounded by the fact that unlike before, tourists are avoiding Asia due to the SARS crisis, and the West due to the events that transpired from September 11th.