The Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Society of Tour Operators of Iran said: Iran’s tourism has stagnated for the fourth year in a row.
According to the report of the electronic publication of jahane-gardesh, quoted by ISNA, Ebrahim Porfaraj made these words in the consensus meeting of the tourism organization forum, which was held in the presence of the vice president of tourism on Tuesday evening, December 1st.
Since 2018, Iran’s tourism has entered a recession at the same time as the events of November – the martyrdom of General Qassem Soleimani, the downing of the Ukrainian plane, the declaration of the Iranian skies as unsafe, and the suspension of international flights – and with the spread of the Corona virus, the scope of this recession continued until November 1400; When the issuance of Iranian visas was stopped.
Nevertheless, the tour guides and tourism activists predicted that it would take at least until 2023 (1402) for Iran’s tourism situation to improve, but since September 1401 and the country’s atmosphere became unstable and subsequently, a number of European countries warned to ban travel. To Iran, tourism once again entered a recession, so that the head of the board of directors of the Association of Travel Service Offices of Iran announced the cancellation of 90% of Iranian tours.
Ebrahim Porfaraj – Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Iranian Tour Operators Society – in the meeting on Tuesday, the first of December, which was attended by private organizations and the vice president of tourism, said: Taking foreign exhibitions and Iran’s presence in international spaces seriously is one of the things that can lead to the exit of This recession will help.
He went on to say: “Experience has shown that you can’t rely too much on the government’s help.” We should not expect much from the government. In all these years, to participate in foreign exhibitions, we were unable to use government assistance to acquire land, except for one year when we proposed assistance to acquire land at the German exhibition, the then vice president of tourism (Mohammed Mohib Khodayi), despite the fact that under There was pressure and there was not much possibility for financial assistance, 300 million tomans helped to get the land and we were able to acquire that land and settle in the pavilion we built with other amounts that we contributed. The issue is not the amount of 300 million tomans they paid, it is the issue of participation. It wouldn’t matter if it gave a lower figure, because the private sector worked and had the power to maneuver, the important thing is the government’s help to advance the goals of the tourism industry.
Pointing to the upcoming international tourism exhibitions, Porfaraj said: We are counting on the help of the Deputy Minister of Tourism. It is a fact that I see him, apart from his government position, in a way with the private sector. We hope that with their support, tourism can get out of this difficult situation. As all tourism activists, including hoteliers, agency owners, etc., know, this year is the fourth year that we are in recession. One of the things that can help to get out of this recession is to take foreign exhibitions seriously, because these exhibitions are the basis for the arrival of tourists to the country and as a result, they generate foreign exchange.
According to the announcement of the Ministry of Cultural Heritage, Tourism and Handicrafts, in 2018, before the corona virus spread and the borders of the countries were closed, more than 8 million people had traveled to Iran, and most of these trips were from Iraq and Azerbaijan respectively. , Afghanistan, Turkey and Pakistan. This ministry has also given statistics that from November 1400 to the end of July 1401, about two million and 950 thousand foreign nationals traveled to Iran and were registered as tourists in the statistics.
In a report published in the spring of 1401, the World Travel Council has also announced that Iran’s tourism in 2021 (1400-1399) has experienced a 40% growth compared to the previous year.
The report of this council also states: Foreign tourists have spent about 2.5 billion dollars in 2021, which is a 31.3% increase compared to the previous year. In 2020, the total spending of foreign tourists in Iran had dropped by 81.6% and reached 1.9 billion dollars.
According to the latest report of the Iranian Statistics Center, domestic tourism has also been on the decline. In the statistical report of this center, it is stated that about 30% of households were able to take a trip in 1400, although economic and social indicators are considered to be effective factors in this decrease. .
The World Travel Council has also reported based on the removal of the restrictions of Corona and the statistics obtained from Iran’s government organizations: Iran’s domestic tourists spent 93,894 billion tomans in 2020, which is more than the previous year. It faced a drop of 39.7%, but in 2021, the spending of domestic tourists in Iran has increased by 48.9% compared to the previous year and reached 139,772 billion tomans. Iran is in recession for the fourth year in a row.
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