The FINANCIAL — “On March 14-17 the Georgian National Tourism Agency together with Adzharia Department of Tourism and Resorts will participate in the exhibition of “Miami Cruise Shipping” in Miami,” Gvantsa Razmadze, Marketing Manager of Department of Tourism and Resorts of Georgia told The FINANCIAL. This year Georgia will be presenting its stand with all cruise opportunities for the first time.
“We are doing an advertisement of Georgia at the exhibition as an attractive travel and cruise country for everybody,” said Razmadze. “It will support further development of American rourism in our country.”
Statistics of the Georgian National Tourism Agency show that the number of foreign visitors increased in 2010 by 38% in comparison to last year. But mostly Georgian resorts are visited by the members of neighbour countries Armenia, Azerbaijan and Ukraine. In spite of this according to the Department of Tourism and Resorts of Georgia the number of American tourists in Georgia was only about 9,300; by 2009 their number increased up to 16,900 and by 2010 reached 20,000, which is about 18% more than last year. 50% of American tourists visit Georgia for professional and business affairs, 22% come to holiday and 17% are arriving to visit their relatives.
“America is one of the best developing tourist markets for Georgia, where interest in our country is constantly growing,” said Razmadze.
“If we look through the statistics of Georgian visitors, America is in 7th place, which means that the number of American visitors in Georgia is not very low.”
Caucasus Travel, one of the travel agencies in Georgia agrees that the number of American tourists increased in 2010: “Visitors from neighbour countries are mostly driving in to the country by car and therefore don’t require our service. In comparison to other foreign countries’ visitors who arrive in Georgia by airplane, the number of Americans isn’t low, moreover it actually surpasses that of many countries. Of course, the more the better and it could be more, but for the moment I think it’s a satisfactory number,” said Maia Qatashvili, Manager of Caucasus Travel.
As Maia Khubuluri, co-manager of Caucasus Travel said in 2008, because of the war all reservations from America were cancelled. As expected the insecurity factor influenced foreign countries. It was also noticeable in 2009 that the number of their visitors decreased to 1,600. They had less tourist groups, among them 110 were Americans. By 2010 the entire number of tourists to the country increased to 2,500, subsequently so grew the number of Americans by 260. This year they are expecting more tourists and they have already seen an increase in visitor numbers.
Global climate change has changed the travel routine in the world. Beka Jakeli, representative of the Georgian National Tourism Department, said the number of tourists in the ski resorts lessened significantly due to a lack of snow cover. Though as he added, by 2011 in comparison to the same period of time in 2010, foreign visitor numbers increased to 47%.
“Most of the foreigners came to Batumi and Tbilisi for business affairs, but some of them came anyway just to visit our ski resorts. We are working with some state and private organizations to improve tourism in our country. We are launching new projects about producing tourism products in Kakheti, namely in Signaghi and Kvareli. We plan to arrange themed festivals in order to promote popularization of Georgian wine. It also gives our subsistence farmers the opportunity to make income from tourism,” said Jakeli.
“I can’t compare 2010 with 2008-2009 in terms of the number of American visitors. Mostly those who come to our hotel are 2-5 man business groups, sometimes but very seldom we also handle tourists who just come to see our country,” said Kakha Lortkipanidze, one of the owners and Director of Hotel Shardeni. “The number of the hotel’s American customers stands in 5-6th place. Most of the customers we see are from Israel, Armenia and Azerbaijan.”
Tina Zaldastanishvli, Manager of the Georgian branch of American tourism company Levon Travel said that their company saw a gap in 2009-2010 of American tourists, which was due in part to their company’s strategy.
“Our company wasn’t concentrated on attracting tourists to Georgia, we were more interested in outgoing tours, but I think the number of American tourists arriving in Georgia today isn’t satisfactory,” said Zaldastanishvili.
“Neighbour countries’ citizens are visiting us because they know our resorts. Many countries don’t know us. Having just one advertisement on CNN isn’t enough. I see the need for having more cultural-historical tours and exhibitions. I don’t think that Americans will come to our resorts to spend their holidays. They would visit our country in greater numbers however if they heard more about our cultural life. They would come here if they knew more about our unique historical and cultural sites.”
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