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Outgoing tourism minister: Unprecedented growth of international tourists due to Bulgaria’s efforts

Thursday, Dec 29, 2016

Sofia. “Unprecedented growth in the number of the international tourists in Bulgaria in 2016 is due to the efforts made by the sector, the government, and the local powers.”
This is what Bulgarian outgoing Minister of Tourism Nikolina Angelkova said speaking for Radio FOCUS.
She stressed that the improvement of the tourist products and services and strengthening Bulgaria’s position as a year-round destination should continue in the next year, too.
“Our tourist product continues improving and I think that it will get even better over the years. Of course, there is always more to be required but the information we receive from the control authorities says that the number of the violations reported in the sector is decreasing with every passing year. There are both good and bad examples. Our job is to aim at offering highest possible quality and target tourists from higher class because from now on we are going to boost the tourism revenues,” Nikolina Angelkova commented.
“What used to be a challenge in 2016 will continue in the next years, too but the most important thing is to preserve the results we achieved this year, to repeat and increase them in 2017, 2018, and to turn them into a stable tendency. What I would like to stress on is that we expect 2017, especially the summer, to be as successful as 2016 because what we managed to realise successfully – to make a twist in the advertising and to work one season ahead, is to have already negotiated growths at most of the major markets for 2017.
For instance, we expect 30% to 40% growth in the number of tourists for the summer of 2017, speaking mostly of the tourists from Germany, Poland, the Czech Republic, the UK, and, of course, from out neighbouring countries and Russia. We managed to regain Russian tourists’ trust, we continue to be a preferred destination in the Top 3 for the next summer.
Thus, these are very important challenges and it is highly important not to slow down the pace we have set because if this happens, the negative results will be felt in 2018,” the outgoing minister said.
“I would like to note that 2016 is unprecedented for Bulgarian tourism with regard to the growth in the number of international tourists – 16% for the first 11 months, 7,850,000, while the revenues for the first ten months – from January until October, amount at BGN 5.9 billion, which is more than 15% growth. This happens for the first time since 1990, since such statistical data are kept,” Ms Angelkova said further.

Source: www.focus-fen.net