Azernews.Az

Friday March 29 2024

Incoming, inbound, outbound tourism see growth in Kazakhstan

13 March 2019 19:17 (UTC+04:00)
Incoming, inbound, outbound tourism see growth in Kazakhstan

By Abdul Kerimkhanov

The tourism potential of recreational resources and historical and cultural heritage allows Kazakhstan to integrate harmoniously into the international tourism market and achieve intensive tourism development in the country.

Tourism in Kazakhstan is developing in all three areas: in the first three quarters of 2018, outbound tourism grew by 4 percent year-on-year (to 8.2 million tourists), entry tourism - by 16.6 percent (to 6.8 million people) ), internal - by 5.8 percent (to 4.6 million tourists).

As many as 78.3 percent of domestic tourists (3.4 million) used the services of places of accommodation - hotels, motels, rest houses and other tourist facilities.

Another 16.3 percent (710,000 tourists) visited natural reserves and other specially protected natural territories. About 5 percent (235,900 tourists) chose for recreation spa facilities, according to energyprom.kz.

Rashid Kuzembaev, Chairman of the Board of JSC NC “Kazakh Tourism”, noted that the growth of domestic tourism was 5 percent for the entire 2018, according to preliminary data.

The indicators on inbound tourism also increased: 8.5 million people visited Kazakhstan, which is 10.2 percent more compared to 2017, and 32 percent more than in 2015.

According to the company, created to promote the country's tourism potential and attract investment to the industry, there is an increase in arrivals from countries such as the UAE (50 percent), India (49 percent), Malaysia (44 percent), Hong Kong (22 percent), Poland (16 percent) and South Korea (15 percent) and the United States (5.8 percent).

The flows of visits by citizens of Germany, Great Britain and a number of other countries remained at the same level.

The head of state, in his Address to the Kazakh people dated October 5, 2018, commissioned to develop a separate sectoral state program for the development of tourism.

The development of the program is at the finishing stage. In addition, a draft law on tourism has been developed, which is also being coordinated and will be submitted to the Parliament of Kazakhstan within six months.

In May 2014, the Concept of development of the tourism industry of Kazakhstan until 2020 was approved.

In 2017, the Concept of development of Kazakh tourism industry until 2023 was adopted,

Among the main tasks of the Concept is the development of domestic and inbound tourism, the development of regional cultural and tourist clusters, increasing the contribution of the tourism industry to the economy of the state, encouraging investment, of a single national tourist brand, etc.

The number of hotels and other accommodations in the past three quarters increased last year to 3,300 and it is 11.6 percent more than in the same period of 2017.

Most of them were hotels without restaurants - 1,260. Another 1,000 places are one-storeyed bungalows, houses and cottages ready to receive tourists, and 703 places - hotels with restaurants.

According to the current Concept of development of the tourism industry of Kazakhstan, the following main types of tourism are distinguished: cultural, educational and ethnographic tourism; sacred or spiritual tourism; social tourism; children and youth tourism; sports tourism; medical tourism; business tourism (MICE tourism); beach tourism; hunting and fishing tourism; agritourism; camping tourism; caravanning and others.

The number of resort areas increased by almost 12 percent over the year, to 970 units in September 2018.

The head of state identified key priority tourist areas to improve the effectiveness of marketing communications. A focus will be on their promotion. These are Almaty mountain cluster, Astana, Shchuchinsko-Borovskaya resort area, Turkestan, Alakol, Mangistau, Bayanaul, Balkhash and Shalkar-Imantau resort area.

During the annual reporting meeting with the population, akim of Almaty Bauyrzhan Baybek said that a master plan of mountain locations of Almaty agglomeration was developed jointly with Austrian and French experts.

Its implementation will make it possible to attract $ 1 billion in private investment, create 200 kilometers of ski slopes and about 30,000 new jobs directly at the facilities, as well as about 45,000 jobs in related industries.

The share of tourism and related services in Almaty is planned to be increased in a gross regional product to 6 percent by 2025.

---

Abdul Kerimkhanov is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @AbdulKerim94

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz

Loading...
Latest See more