Over 800,000 Azerbaijani tourists visit Turkey
By Narmina Mammadova
Majority of Azerbaijani tourists chose Turkey as a main destination, which attracts them with coastal areas such as Antalya, Bodrum, and Kusadasi.
Azerbaijani tourists often travel to Turkey for vacation in July and August. Turkey which provides high-quality and inexpensive vacation for many international tourists has become one of the most favorite destinations for many Azerbaijanis.
In January-November 2018, 802,820 Azerbaijani tourists visited Turkey, which is 12.57 percent more than in the same period of 2017, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism of Turkey told Trend on December 28.
The share of Azerbaijani citizens in the total number of foreigners who visited Turkey during the eleven months of 2018 was 2.24 percent, the ministry said.
The ministry noted, that in November 2018, 59,100 tourists from Azerbaijan visited Turkey, which is 9.51 percent more than in the same month of 2017.
"The share of Azerbaijani citizens in the total number of foreigners who visited Turkey in November 2018 accounted to 3.01 percent. For comparison, this figure was 3.27 percent in November 2017" the ministry added.
In November 2018, 1.9 million tourists visited Turkey, which is 19.97 percent more compared to November 2017, according to the ministry.
As of January-November 2018, 37.5 million tourists visited Turkey, which is 22.25 percent more than in January-November 2017, the ministry noted.
Today, the Azerbaijani government does all the best to attract more tourists to the country. To this end it is necessary to strengthen the propaganda of Azerbaijan’s potential beyond its borders, since this sector brings the country not only currency, but also allows to open new jobs, which is especially important for regions of the country.
Numerous studies show that tourism is one of the leading positions among the spheres of non-oil sector in terms of its prospects and the country does its best to create profitable conditions for development of this sphere and attract more tourists to the country.
Azerbaijan is among the developing countries in the field of tourism, occupying the 39th place among 148 countries in terms of global competitiveness in tourism.
In January-November 2018, the number of foreigners traveling from 193 countries to Azerbaijan amounted to 2.5 million people.
This is 6% more than it was in the same period of 2017, the state tourism agency reported.
Tourists from Russia, Georgia and the Middle East accounted for 65% of the total number of travelers.
Some 31.2 percent of the tourists were from Russia, 19.8 percent - from Georgia, 10 percent - from Turkey, 9.2 percent - from Iran, 3.3 percent - from the UAE.
The number of tourists from the CIS countries increased by 4.7 percent in January-September 2018, as compared to the same period in 2017.
As many as 88,900 people from the EU countries visited Azerbaijan (an increase of 8.9 percent).
The Committee reported that 65.5 percent of the tourists visiting Azerbaijan are men, while 34.5 percent account for women.
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