Azernews.Az

A conference to mark the completion of the twinning project on strengthening the capacity of the department of tourism in the Ministry of Culture and Tourism of Azerbaijan has been held at the Hyatt Regency Baku hotel.

The project was realized by the 2 countries and 20 experts, AzerTag news agency reported.

Addressing the event, Azerbaijan`s Minister of Culture and Tourism Abulfas Garayev spoke of the progress achieved to develop tourism in the country over the last years. He noted the execution of relevant state programs approved by President Ilham Aliyev boosted the development of tourism and attracted to nearly 2 million tourists to the country.

The Minister has also touched upon realization of a number of projects on development of tourism in the regions, adding there are a lot of hotels, resort centers in all cities and regions of Azerbaijan.

The Minister has also spoke of the Twining program and hailed its results as valuable contributions to Azerbaijan`s tourism sector.

Garayev called on the employees of the Ministry`s tourism department to make every effort to boost the tourism sector in the country.

Speaking to the event, head of the EU Delegation to Azerbaijan, Ambassador Malena Mard said the development of the tourism sector is very important for the EU member countries.

She said tourism sector constitutes 5 percent of EU GDP, adding these types of projects create new opportunities to attract more people to the sector.

She underlined Azerbaijan has every opportunities for development of tourism.
Addressing the event, representatives of the projects partner countries - Austrian Ambassador to Azerbaijan Sylvia Meier-Kajbic and Charge D`Affaires of Lithuanian embassy to Azerbaijan Sarune Kubiliute hailed the progress achieved in Azerbaijan to develop tourism sector.

Deputy Minister of Culture and Tourism of Azerbaijan, project leader on Azerbaijani side Nazim Samadov and MS Project Leader Florian Sengstschmid also addressed the event