India enjoyed 12% tourism growth; much thanks to Religious Tourism

Website: http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Tourist_arrivals_jump_12_in_first_half_of_08/articleshow/3254499.cms

NEW DELHI: You’ve heard about the battered hospitality sector and agonised over the plunging fortunes of airlines. But here’s some cause for cheer. The travel and tourism industry in India is bucking the recessionary trend big time and in the first six months of this year, tourism arrivals have seen a jump of 12% over the corresponding period in 2007. Last year, tourist arrivals to the country were 2.6 million as compared to 2.03 million the year before. According to the ministry of tourism (MoT), foreign exchange earnings from this sector also showed a growth of 22% at $6.21 billion against $5.08 billion in the corresponding period in 2007. And the positive trend doesn’t just stop at inbound foreign tourists. The domestic tourist stats too show a phenomenal growth. On that front, the figure this year is expected to cross the 600-million mark, against 526 million in 2007 and 460 million in 2006. Interestingly, out of the 526 million domestic tourists, only 276 million were urban residents and the rest 250 million were rural residents. This trend, experts feel, shows a boom in religious tourism and not surprisingly, leading tour and travel companies have adopted new marketing strategies to promote these destinations. Meanwhile, the ministry of tourism, is definitely not complaining about the increasing number of footfalls in India from America and the UK, which have become the biggest source markets. According to sources, more than 31% of the foreign traffic came to India from these two countries, with Canada and France next on the list. Says Leena Nandan, joint secretary, ministry of tourism: “Our aggressive international campaign is paying dividends and the figures are saying it all. The Asian region, too, is important for us and we are going to aggressively market there. These days, tourism is one of the fastest growing sectors in the country. It offers immense opportunities to entrepreneurs in various segments. What is detrimental to our tourism growth is the lack of basic facilities at our monuments, pilgrimage places and tourist sites. We need to have a higher involvement of key stakeholders in improving the basic facilities as the government cannot do this job alone.” Adds Bharat Sidheshwar Rai, ED of Swift Travel: “Marketing for foreign business follows the traditional travel route. Our marketing answer is to have tie-ups in all these destinations to make both travel and stay easy.”