Global destinations beckon tourists as summer vacation nears

India's recovery from the economic slowdown has triggered a new enthusiasm among countries that are global tourism destinations, as they seek a greater share of the Indian traveller's wallet. As Asia is leading the global recovery trend, it's the Asian countries that are in the forefront to woo Indian tourists.

Among those who have opened a tourism promotion campaign are Nepal and Malaysia, which recently descended on the city with contingents of travel operators, hoteliers and other tourism-related service providers.The sales mission of Tourism Malaysia contained over 45 tour operators and property owners, and was led by James Dawos Mamit, deputy minister of tourism.

Mamit told TOI that his country's efforts to draw Indian tourists in greater numbers, which began 10 years ago, has brought excellent results and Malaysia is now among the most preferred international travel destination for Indians. "An office of Tourism Malaysia opened in India in 2000. Only 45,000 Indians had visited Malaysia the year before. In 2010, an amazing number of 6,90,849 tourists from India visited Malaysia and recorded a growth of 17.1 per cent over 2009 despite it being a recessionary year. In the last decade, India, which ranked 13th as source market to Malaysia, has risen to become the second largest."

The United Nations World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) has said in its review for 2010 that Asia, with a growth of 13 per cent in tourist arrivals, was the first region to recover from the economic crisis and the strongest growing region in 2010. International tourist arrivals into Asia reached a new record at 204 million last year, up from 181 million in 2009, the world tourism body has noted.

According to UNWTO, India is one of the fastest growing outbound tourist markets and will account for 50 million outbound tourists by 2020. Worldwide, tourist destinations are eyeing for a piece of this pie.

Mamit said visitors from India to his country include families (some of them taking their first international holiday) as well as corporate travelers in meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions (MICE) segment. About 26 per cent of all Indians visiting Malaysia are repeat travellers, he added.

Shubhada Joshi, director, Girikand Travels Pvt Ltd, said there is a marked preference of tourists for South East region as this region scores on logistics and affordability. "The lot of mid-middle class travellers aspiring to set feet on a foreign land is growing fast. They find neighbouring and South East Asian countries suitable as vacations in these countries come close to domestic vacations in terms of time taken and cost," she said.

Another country to send a tourism industry's 'India Sales Mission 2011' to Pune was India's neighbour Nepal that roped in five tourism companies, in addition to its own tourism department, to pitch for business here.

Diwakar Rana, head of Tourism Marketing and Promotion for Nepal, said 2011 is being celebrated as Nepal Tourism Year and his country will like to capitalise on the proximity - geographical as well as social and religious - it has with India. "The NTY 2011 is envisioned as a means to reach economic prosperity through tourism by bringing in a million tourists to the country and Nepal has targeted India as a major source market to fulfill its objective," Rana said.

Flight connectivity between Nepal and India is on the rise and Indian tourists to Nepal now have easier access with seat capacity on Indo-Nepal sector up from 6,000 to more than 30,000 per week.

There are early signs of Nepal's efforts bearing fruits as its Tribhuvan International Airport registered a 26.2 per cent rise in visitor arrivals in January 2011, compared to the same month last year, Rana said. India constitutes a major market for Nepal and has recorded positive growth of 35.5 per cent, he said.

Source = timesofindia.indiatimes.com