INDIA 02 AsIA 10 mIDDle eAst 12 europe 13 …...Hyatt Regency Gurgaon, New Delhi NCR. P# 22 Asian airports report passenger growth driven by China & India in 2015 P# 25 Ranveer Singh

BLTM to give further boost to Business, MICE and Luxury travel in India

E-tourist visa facility extended to citizens of 37 more countries

P# 02

P# 10

TAT projects rise in Indian weddings and honeymoons

P# 11

Nepal Tourism declares 2016 Year of Survival, focus on India market

P# 12

P# 13

P# 15

P# 18

P# 19

Oman records 17% increase in Indian arrivals in 2015

Scotland becomes India Ready

Mexico witnesses 32 million tourists in 2015

Australia records a rise in Indian tourist numbers in 2015

Kenya announces fee waiver to promote family tours

Volume V l Issue 11 Pages 32 www.travelnewsdigest.in `50 / us $5 16-30 APrIL 2016

Posted at NDPSO, New Delhi - 110001 on 5/6 & 20/21 of every month | Date of Publication 01/02 &15/16 every month | Postal Registration No. DL(S) - 01/3404/2015-17 | RNI No. DELENG/2011/40217

The Business and Luxury Travel Mart (BLTM) - India’s definitive show on Business, MICE and Luxury Travel was launched this February at OTM in Mumbai.

Business travel industry in India is emerging as a specialised market with differentiated needs, in tandem with the global trends. According to the Global Business Travel Association (GBTA), “Fifteen years from now, India will likely be a top-five market in business travel spending.” On the other hand, lux-ury travel is rapidly flourishing owing to the new phase of con-spicuous consumption by the affluent Indian traveller, where the demand is fuelled not only by FITs but also uniquely Indian markets for weddings, and other social occasions.

Destination sellers and travel service providers can reap rich dividends from BLTM when it is hosted at the sprawling 20,000 sq ft convention hall of Hyatt Regency Gurgaon on Octo-ber 24-25, 2016. As the first full-fledged travel mart of its kind in India, the show will focus on sellers from global business, MICE and luxury travel segments, who will interact with cor-porate MNC buyers from around Delhi and National Capital

Region, along with qualified meeting planners and incentive travel planners hosted from other major Indian cities.

With the National Capital Region accounting for huge busi-ness travel and MICE spending, BLTM is strategically located to tap into this biggest source market. Selling at the show will be convention and visitor promotion bureaus (CVBs), national tourism organisations (NTOs), state tourism boards (STBs), hotels, airlines, venues, travel management firms, event man-agement companies, ground handling and logistic companies and other MICE service providers. In addition to event organ-isers, luxury travel agents and wedding destination planners, film destination managers will also actively participate in this one-stop shop to highlight the marketing opportunity of pro-moting destinations for and through film shoots.

The organisers of BLTM, Fairfest Media Ltd, are not only the pioneers but also the leading travel show organisers since more than two decades.

For more details visit bltm.co.in

24 - 25 October 2016Hyatt Regency Gurgaon, New Delhi NCR.

P# 22

Asian airports report passenger growth driven by China & India in 2015

P# 25

Ranveer Singh & Alia Bhatt become new faces of MakeMyTrip

P# 27

ESOI & MoT to work together to promote sustainable tourism

Convention Hall, Hyatt Regency, Gurgaon

INDIA 02 AsIA 10 oceANIA 18europe 13mIDDle eAst 12 AmerIcAs 15 cArIbbeAN 21 globAl 22 respoNsIble tourIsm 27 eveNts 30techNology 25AfrIcA 19

Hyatt Regency, Gurgaon

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 • 2INDIA

Summer Escape in Amazing Thailand

Koh Lipe, Satun, Southern Thailand

Contact us:Tourism Authority of Thailand, New Delhi Office:E-mail: [email protected] | www.facebook.com/TAT.newdelhiTourism Authority of Thailand, Mumbai Office:E-mail: [email protected] | www.facebook.com/TourismAuthorityofThailandMumbai www.tourismthailand.org

Editorial

Editor & Publisher Sanjiv Agarwal

Editorial DirectorGazanfar Ibrahim

Marketing

Advisors Abraham JohnSheila LeongProject DirectorsAmit NagVijay AdhikariAssociate DirectorsRajarshi DeRaj Kapoor SinghR MaheshTarique EbrahimDipankar GhoshRaminder SinghGeneral ManagerFatima D’CostaDeputy General ManagersPratiksha RajapureShreyas JainProject ManagersYC AnilPhilomena D’SouzaAssistant Project ManagersDeepti V MurthyShiv Shankar DuttaTania DasRamesh ChauhanSugandhi VarmaKanika Singh

Production

Media DirectorJune Mukherjee

Project ExecutivesGopanjali RoyDisha Roy ChoudhuryChirajit Nath

Design TeamDilip MannaRitam MaityMrityunjay KumarSuman Pramanik

Administration

Joint Managing Director Rajiv Agarwal

Executive DirectorHarsh Agarwal

senior Manager - Accounts & FinanceUma Sureka

Travel News Digest (TND) is printed and published by Sanjiv Kumar Agarwal on behalf of Fairfest Media Ltd.

Printed at International Print -o-pac Ltd, C-4 to C-11, Hosiery complex, Phase-II, Extension, Noida - 201 301, Distt. G. B. Nagar, UP.

Published at 216A/1Gautam Nagar, Gulmohar Park, New Delhi-110 049

Editor Sanjiv Kumar Agarwal

No responsibility will be accepted for unsolicited manuscripts and photos received. Despite careful selection of sources, no responsibility can be taken for accuracy.

The Publishers and the Editors do not necessarily individually or collectively identify themselves with the views expressed by respective writers and contributors in this journal. The views expressed are those of the authors only. The magazine assumes no liability or responsibility of any kind in connection with the information thereof.

All right reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part is strictly prohibited without written permission from the publisher.

Head Office 216A/1, Gautam Nagar, Gulmohar Park, New Delhi - 110 049 Tel: (91)(11) 26866874

registered Office25C/ 1, Belvedere Road, Alipur,Kolkata 700 027 Tel : (91)(33) 24790010-14

Branch OfficesMUMBAI (91) (22) 26372883 / 95

HYDERABAD (91) (40) 27896149

BANGALORE (91) (80) 26761598

AHMEDABAD (91) (79) 2646 1217

….…………………………………………

Volume V • Issue 11

For feedback and information,

write in at [email protected]

Web : www.travelnewsdigest.in

Fairfest Media Limited(CIN - U74140WB1988PLC045101)

Dr Mahesh Sharma launches 24×7 toll-free Tourist Infoline in 12 international languages

Tourism Minister Dr Mahesh Sharma launched the ‘24×7 Toll-Free Tourist Infoline in 12 International Languages including Hindi and English’ available on the existing Toll-Free Number 1800111363 or on a short code 1363 at a function in New Delhi. This proj-ect is being implemented by the Ministry of Tour-ism, Government of India through TATA BSS who have been associated with the work after an open bidding process. The languages handled by the contact centres include 10 international languages besides English and Hindi, namely, Arabic, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Por-tuguese, Russian and Spanish. The Minister also announced that very soon his Ministry will launch an ‘Incredible India Mobile App’ to facilitate tour-ists in a better way.

This Infoline service will provide information

relating to travel and tourism in India to the domes-tic and international tourists and to assist the call-ers with advice on action to be taken during times of distress while travelling in India and if need be to alert the concerned authorities.

The Minister pointed out that the calls made by tourists (both international and domestic) while in India will be free of charge. The international tour-ists in India and also international callers who speak the aforesaid languages will be directed to the call agents proficient in the respective language.

Vinod Zutshi, Secretary, Ministry of Tourism in his address said that the focus will be on IEC i.e. Information, Education and Communication for the tourists followed by a helpdesk and then their safety and security. The website of Incredible India is also being revived to make it more tourist-friendly.

Commencing from November 27, 2014, e-Tourist Visa facility was available until February 25, 2016 for citizens of 113 countries arriving at 16 airports in India. The Gov-ernment of India has extended this scheme for citizens of 37 more countries with effect from February 26, 2016 tak-ing the tally to 150 countries.

A total of 1,17, 210 tourists arrived in February 2016 on e-Tourist Visa as compared to 24,985 during the month of February 2015 registering a growth of 369.1%.

The high growth may be attributed to introduction of e-Tourist Visa for 150 countries as against the earlier coverage of 43 countries. The percentage shares of Top 10

source countries availing e-Tourist Visa facilities during February, 2016 were - UK (27.86%), USA (13.85%), France (8.08%), Russian Federation (6.21%), Germany (4.92%), China (4.91%), Canada (4.21%), Australia (3.64%), Repub-lic of Korea (2.15%) and Ukraine (2.00%).

The percentage shares of top 10 ports in tourist arrivals on e-Tourist Visa during February, 2016 were as follows - New Delhi Airport (40.96%), Mumbai Airport (20.62%), Goa Airport (13.42%), Chennai Airport (6.19%), Bengaluru Airport (5.42%), Kochi Airport (3.44%), Kolkata Airport (2.50%), Trivandrum Airport (1.88%,) Hyderabad Airport (1.86%) and Ahmedabad Airport (1.58%).

E-tourist visa facility extended to citizens of 37 more countries

Ministry of Tourism’s recognised adventure tour oper-ators will soon be able to procure, register and use sat-ellite phones on non-restricted adventure tourism cir-cuits in India. This was revealed by Akshay Kumar, President, Adventure Tour Operators Association of India (ATOAI) at the inauguration ceremony of the association’s 12th Convention in Hanuwantiya, District Khandwa, Madhya Pradesh.

“We aim to develop Hanuwantiya, the 950 sq km big-gest water body in Asia on a public-private partnership (PPP) model and promote adventure sports in the vicin-ity to add overnights to the destination. Connectivity is a major issue which will soon be addressed by the MP government by developing an airstrip near the destina-tion. This will shorten the travel duration and increase footfalls to the mesmerising destination of Hanuwan-tiya. I call for private players to establish resorts and other tourism-related activities at this place,” Shivraj Singh Chouhan, Chief Minister, MP, outlined.

ATOAI and Madhya Pradesh Tourism also signed a MoU as per which ATOAI would be conducting a one-year skill development and capacity building certifica-tion course, especially for the rural population of MP. Under the same, basic training would be provided to conduct adventure sports in concerned areas. “Final details of the commencement of the course are in the pipeline,” said Tejbir Singh Anand, Chairman, ATOAI Convention 2016.

MoT-recognised ATOAI operators to have access to satellite phones by May 2016

Summer Escape in Amazing Thailand

Koh Lipe, Satun, Southern Thailand

Contact us:Tourism Authority of Thailand, New Delhi Office:E-mail: [email protected] | www.facebook.com/TAT.newdelhiTourism Authority of Thailand, Mumbai Office:E-mail: [email protected] | www.facebook.com/TourismAuthorityofThailandMumbai www.tourismthailand.org

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 4 • india

The Association of Domestic Tour Operators in India (ADTOI) is organising its 7th Annual Con-vention (April 8 - 11, 2016) at Hotel Ramada in Kha-

juraho, Madhya Pradesh. “Domestic Tourism: Bil-lion+ Opportunities” is the theme of this grand event. Hosted by Government of Madhya Pradesh, the Con-vention is supported by the Department of Tourism.

Jyoti Kapur, President, ADTOI informed, “ADTOI is in the process of rebuilding, reinventing and

creating visibility in the trade on pan-India basis. This is the age of cultivating the culture of innova-tion, entrepreneurship and communication and we should adapt the change, in order to take forward our businesses to the next level.”

Sanjay Aggarwal, Vice President, ADTOI and Convention Chairman highlighted plans of promot-ing the tourism potential of Khajuraho, popular for its exotic temples, and its surrounding destinations to attract visitors from all over the country.

Post inauguration, the business sessions on the first two days as well as colourful evening pro-grammes are being dedicated to showcasing the rich cultural heritage of central India. Activity-based programmes are also being organised like a visit to national park and escorted tour of temples in the early hours.

MoT sanctions `20 crore for development in Varanasi

7th Annual Convention of ADTOI in Khajuraho, Madhya Pradesh

Ministry of Tourism has cleared projects worth `20 crore for Varanasi. These include sound and light show, a Buddha theme park in Sarnath and conservation of two temples — Gurudham and Markandey Mahadev temple. The Ministry’s Central Sanctioning and Monitoring Committee (CSMC), headed by Vinod Zutshi, Secretary Tour-ism, Government of India, met recently to approve the infrastructure projects.

Varanasi is one of the cities that come under the Tourism Ministry’s PRASAD (Pilgrimage Reju-venation and Spirituality Augmentation Drive) scheme.

Zutshi said, “The project has been sanctioned seven crore rupees and will be executed in the next 12-18 months. The show will trace the history of Sarnath with the stupa as the backdrop.”

Plans are also afoot to develop the Sarangnath pond at Sarnath. Sarnath is a place of high tour-ist interest in light of its significant place in Lord Buddha’s life. The tourism ministry has been working towards promoting Buddhist tourism and this has been a special focus for Prime Min-ister Modi on his visits to China and Japan in the last few months.

Jammu & Kashmir are planning to develop its own golf circuit in a big way for the international tourist as well as the domestic corporate tourists. Sundeep Kumar Nayak, Principal Secretary to Government - Tour-ism Department, Government of Jammu & Kashmir, after taking his position gave an exclusive interview to Travel News Digest, speaking about the tourism devel-opments in Jammu & Kashmir. “It will be a MICE kind of arrangement where you come not only to play but also mix business and play together. We are trying to tie up with golf circuits like South Asian and South East Asian golf circuits so that golf is promoted as an inde-pendent destination in Jammu & Kashmir and also as a part of MICE,” he said.

He also added, “We have improved and refurbished our entire infrastructure in the Kashmir valley as well as in Ladakh and Jammu. We have a new circuit of pre-mium golf courses Pahalgam, Gulmarg and the royal spring golf course in Srinagar. The Pahalgam property of the tourism corporation has come up very well. The Pahalgam club is a brand new property which we have commissioned in November-December last year and we have also introduced helicopter sightseeing in the val-ley. Apart from this, we have given a lot of incentives to our own tour and travel trade where they have also gone for the renovation of their properties and also different aspects of the transport. The state government has gone for a major role building exercise, they have improved the riding surface in the valley in Jammu province, and all this are aimed at facilitating the visitors. I will make special mention of the Vaishno Devi tourism, as almost 95% of our tourists come to the Mata Darshan and it is being developed as a circuit. We have plans to introduce shuttle bus service from Patnitop so that people can stay a few days more and visit the nearby places.”

Nayak said, “Yusmarg is one of the most beautiful and unexplored places in Kashmir valley. Yusmarg Development Authority is planning to introduce ski-ing in a good way along with other adventure sports like mountaineering. The access to Yusmarg has been improved with better roads and the accommodation

is also very good. We are re-establishing and revisit-ing our relationship with the Indian Mountaineering Foundation. We also had a meeting with the Himala-yan Mountaineering Group recently and we are going to invite all the people to come to Kashmir and Ladakh for mountaineering and trekking. We are also devel-oping new trekking routes in the upper reaches of Jammu along with the Mughal road which is highly

unexplored and it will come up as a good destination for the trekkers.”

Nayak also noted that for the last couple of years, Bollywood has taken note of the new infrastructure and new things which have come up in the Kashmir val-ley and Jammu and Ladakh. “We are going to pitch the film industry to take up Kashmir valley as a shooting location a big way and we are working towards that. Not only Bollywood, we would also like to invite other filmmakers from rest of the country and outside India to come and shoot in Jammu & Kashmir, for that we are going to have single window clearance for filming.”

Lastly, Nayak stated that there are many destina-tions which are pristine and untouched in Jammu and Kashmir like in the Chenab valley there are many such destinations and in the districts of Kastovert and the district of Doda, Adarva and also in places like Rajouri and Poonch. These are the places where perhaps the tourists would like to explore when they come to Kashmir, apart from the areas in Kupwara district and Baramulla district. Places like Uri, Keran, Machil and Lolab Valley where tourists can come in addition to the Sonmarg and upper reaches of Sonmarg.

Jammu & Kashmir focuses on golf tourism to attract more tourists

Ministry of Tourism launches the Swachh Parayatan Mobile AppDr Mahesh Sharma, Minister of State for Tourism, Government of India, has launched the ‘Swachh Parayatan Mobile App’. This project is being implemented by the Ministry of Tourism, Gov-ernment of India through DeGS and NIC. This mobile app is available on Google Search Engine as ‘Swachh Paryatan’. Initially, it is available on Android Phones and very soon it will be avail-able on Apple and Microsoft also. This mobile app shall be monitored by the Project Monitoring Unit of Swachh Bharat Mission in Ministry of Tourism.

Addressing on the occasion, Dr Sharma said that through the mobile app, the Ministry of Tourism has decided to facilitate the general pub-lic, who are the largest stakeholders, with the chance to communicate their complaints about any unclean area/garbage piles in and around tourist destinations.

The Minister informed that the recently launched tourist Infoline is getting 18,000 responses daily and is very successful.

Vinod Zutshi, Secretary, Ministry of Tourism in his address said that the year 2016 has begun with good news in the tourism sector. A Mega Tourism Summit is expected in July-August this year which will boost the sector. He said that Ministry of Tour-ism and Ministry of Culture will work together to make this mobile app a successful one.

To start with, 25 Adarsh Smarak Monuments protected by Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) have been identified for inclusion in the app. The application would be scaled up to include more monuments as the campaign expands. This mobile app enables a citizen to take a photograph of gar-bage at the monument and upload the same along with his/her remarks. The application then sends an SMS to the ASI Nodal Officer concerned with the monument upon receipt of which the Nodal Officer gets the garbage cleared/removed. The Nodal Officer thereafter sends a confirmation about the redressal of the complaint through an SMS to the complainant.


Devendra Fadnavis, Chief Minister of Maharashtra, has approved the new Tourism Policy 2016, granting complete industry status to the sector along with the financial incentives accorded to investments for the same in the state.

Tourism had enjoyed industry status in the state since 1999 but was deprived of the financial incentives.

Under the new policy, tourism projects will be cat-egorised as mega, ultramega, large, medium, small and micro. The policy will provide benefits like reim-bursement of VAT, concession in luxury taxes, power and stamp duty.

Valsa Nair Singh, Principal Secretary Tourism and Culture, Government of Maharashtra, said, “With the new Tourism Policy, we shall witness high growth in tourists coming to Maharashtra. The fiscal incentives are highly encouraging...the policy lays a road map for the niche segments of the industry.”

To ensure seamless business activity in the state, the new policy will provide a five-yearly renewal of licenses instead of an annual renewal. This has been a long drawn demand of the hotel and restaurant

industry in the state.With the new policy in operation, the state now

expects an increase in investments in the sector to the tune of `30,000 crore, generating approximately 10,000 new jobs. The policy also envisages doubling of tourism revenue in the next five years.

A new tourism directorate will be set up to moni-tor the implementation of the policy.

New Tourism Policy in Maharashtra promises complete industry status plus incentives

According to the Shipping Ministry, ‘marriage cruises’ on the sea will soon be permitted which can accommo-date as many as 4,000-5,000 persons for holding any social event. Couples in India could marry at sea on lux-ury cruises that the government wants to facilitate at locations like Goa, Mumbai and Andaman & Nicobar Islands, informed Union Minister Nitin Gadkari.

“Marriage cruise service will be started soon with an additional banquet and entertainment facilities. We are considering a proposal from a private player who is keen on starting the service between Mumbai and Chen-nai. A decision will be taken soon,” added the Minister.

He also stated that the Shipping Ministry has sought the Directorate General of Civil Aviation’s (DGCA)

approval for operating 25 seaplanes by an investor.“We have received a proposal from an investor to

operate 25 seaplanes in India at the first leg. The pro-posal has been sent to DGCA for approval and once it is through, the services can be started here,” Gadkari said.

The government’s priority is also to develop its 1,300 islands and 218 lighthouses to attract tourists, he said adding it was committed to sustainable development through environment-friendly policies.

“The shipping and the tourism ministry will together redraft the cruise shipping policy. We are not only look-ing at upgrading our port infrastructure but will also include other services such as floating restaurants, etc. to encourage private players to invest in cruise tourism,” Gadkari added.

Marriage cruises to be promoted in India

Norwegian company SeaDream Yacht Club has been promoting ultra-luxury sea travel vacations in India. The company has two yachts – M/Y SeaDream I and M/Y SeaDream II that cater to a select and exclusive clientele. “SeaDream is a brand catering to the elite and luxury driven audience. The last three years of operations in India, we have observed that lux-ury yachting is still at a nascent stage. Nevertheless, we have witnessed a growth in demand for yacht-ing in the country,” said Sudesh Kishore, President, SeaDream Yacht Club, India.

Kishore went on to elaborate on the difference between yachting and cruising. “Yachting is slow, relaxed and exclusive. With only 112 guests on each ship there are no crowds onboard. Attire is casual, the ship travels at its own pace. They visit small inti-mate ports, which otherwise a large ship would not have been able to travel to. Yachting voyages include overnight ports.”

The company has been educating the luxury travel trade partners and media across India about the unique and exclusive sea travel experiences. “Information about our exclusive offers and voy-ages are shared with the travel trade and media pub-lications. From time-to-time we also interact with elite guests from our main markets of Mumbai, New Delhi and Bengaluru through interactive sessions,” stated Kishore.

MTDC introduces budget holiday packages to boost tourism

Tourist arrivals in Goa went beyond five million mark in 2015

SeaDream promotes the ultra-luxury yacht experience in India

An initiative to encourage more travellers to visit the state, Maharashtra Tourism Development Commission (MTDC) has formulated a new range of budget holiday packages.

The new budget tour packages include a discount of 25% on bookings for Indian tourists residing outside Maharashtra, and a discount of 20% on bookings for senior citizens (age 65+).

A 10% discount is applicable for NRIs who book for Maharashtra tour through MTDC, while 20% discounts are valid for trips to destinations including Ganpatip-ule, Mahabaleshwar, Matheran, Ajanta T Junction, Ajante, Bhandardara, Malshej Ghat, Chikhaldar, Pan-shed, Holy pilgrims on Shirdi, Kaila, Nagpur, Truvada and Tuljapur.

Students (aged 6-16) from schools across the state can enjoy a discount of 20% on bookings from Monday to Friday, and complimentary food will be available. The offer is valid for schools in Pune, Aurangabad, Ratnag-iri, Nashik, Mumbai and Nagpur.

MTDC has also updated its rate card with a 10% and 20% discount on bookings made during on-season and off-season respectively. It has also designed special packages for tours all over Maharashtra.

The overall tourist arrivals in Goa increased by 30.54% and by 22% during the monsoons in 2015. No drop in the number of foreign tourist arrivals has been reported by the Department of Tourism, Government of Goa. While domestic tourist arrivals escalated by 34%, foreign tour-ist arrivals were up by 5.4%. Goa welcomed visitors from UK, Russia, UAE, USA, Portugal, South Africa and many others. A total of 52,97,902 tourists visited Goa in 2015 which includes 47,56,422 domestic tourists and 5,41,480 foreign tourists.

The e-Tourist Visa (ETV) regime introduced by the central government in December 2014 has also facilitated easy access of foreign tourists to Goa. Within a year (till December 31, 2015), a total of 49,626 ETVs were issued to foreign tourists.

Dilip Parulekar, Minister for Tourism, said, “We have received a good response from foreign and domestic tour-ists in 2015 as in the past. Our new initiatives are showing substantial results and we are optimistic that the tour-ists will choose Goa as their destination for holidaying.”

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 7 INDIA •

Telangana State Tourism Development Corporation (TSTDC) launched two new catamaran yachts for the Hussain Sagar Lake at Lumbini Park in Hyderabad. The yachts were inaugurated by Sania Mirza, brand ambassador for Telangana State.

The new catamaran boats have been procured from the USA and will be available to ferry the public at the Hus-sain Sagar Lake. The boats can accom-modate 12-15 members per trip. TSTDC has introduced the luxury ride pack-age with these two new boats, which will be priced at `100 per person. Addi-tionally, TSTDC has also launched party packages priced at `2000 per hour at these luxury boats. The party pack-ages will begin post 8:30 PM and can be availed up to 12:00 AM. The boats will not only provide a luxurious ambi-ence to tourists but also have a lower seating which is closer to the water dur-ing the ride.

Speaking at the inauguration Sania Mirza, Indian Tennis player and brand ambassador for Telangana State said, “I am pleased to launch the two new lux-ury yachts at Hussain Sagar Lake. I had a wonderful experience through the ride which brought back the memories of my childhood. The Telangana Tour-ism Corporation is very proactive in not only assessing the needs of the tourists but also introducing exciting opportuni-ties for the local crowd. I am sure that the tourists will have a great experience with the new yachts.”

Since the formation of Telangana, the Telangana State Tourism Develop-ment Corporation has taken significant strides to strengthen Telangana’s posi-tion as a world-class tourist destination. The Corporation has recently launched an adventurous Helicopter ride, provid-ing a spectacular aerial view of the majes-tic twin cities, at affordable prices.

The sunrise state of Andhra Pradesh, blessed with unique temples, enriched with pristine beaches, stunning hill stations and scenic backwaters, contin-ued to mesmerise millions of tour-ists across the globe by registering 1218.3 lakh tourist arrivals in 2015.

Domestic footfalls to the state increased to 1218.3 lakh in 2015 as against 933 lakh in 2014, thereby registering a growth of 30%.

Neerabh Kumar Prasad, IAS, Principal Secretary to Govern-ment, Tourism & Culture said, “In our endeavour to make Andhra Pradesh as India’s most preferred tourist destination, this data comes to us as a great encourage-ment. Under the leadership of our Chief Minister, N Chandrababu Naidu and with a focused strat-egy in place, we are hopeful of this growth momentum to be replicated year after year going forward. We will continue to invest and focus

on developing tourism in Andhra Pradesh of global standard.”

Anantapur district which houses the famous Puttaparthi and Lord Veerbhadra temple at Lepakshi became the most vis-ited destination by foreign tour-ists with a footfall of 1.37 lakh foreigners.

Among international tourist arrivals, 2.37 lakh tourists vis-ited the state during the year 2015 as against 66,333 who visited in 2014. The majority of the foreign tourists were from the Southeast Asian countries such as Singapore, Malaysia and Middle East coun-tries such as Dubai among others.

Dr R P Khajuria, IFS, Commis-sioner, Department of Tourism said, “Andhra Pradesh is one of the few states in India, which has such a rich diversity in terms of tour-ism and has the capacity to attract tourists across all age groups. The potential that lays ahead for the state is vast and these numbers are testimonials to the fact that increasing number of tourists both in India and abroad are realising what the state can offer.”

Andhra Pradesh also wit-nessed a large number of footfalls from business travellers owing to its strong focus on being an ideal investment destination and creat-ing a conducive environment for doing business.

Telangana State Tourism Development Corporation introduces luxury yacht rides at Hussain Sagar

Andhra Pradesh attracts 1218.3 lakh tourists in 2015

Semi-submarine Ocean Safari launched in Andaman & Nicobar IslandHeaven on Ocean Tourism recently unveiled its ‘Coral Safari’, which was launched by Chief Secretary of Andaman & Nicobar Island, Anand Prakash. ‘Coral Safari’ is a semi sub-marine which will take one into the deep sea in a comfortable 100 seater fully air-conditioned cabin.

“We are happy to have Coral Safari launch their services in our waters for the best tourist experience. The crystal clear shallow waters with worlds most colourful under water corals and rar-est species of fishes make Andaman and Nicobar Islands heavenly,” stated Anand Prakash, IAS, Chief Secretary of Andaman & Nicobar Islands.

“Coral Safari will be a game changer for everyone who loves

underwater experience,” said Prasanna V, Director of Heaven on Ocean Tourism Private Limited. “With this launch, we have enhanced the facilities in Andaman & Nicobar Islands, and we will be leading the next generation of underwater expe-rience in this region, and while oth-ers may try to follow, we will continue to do what we do best: exceed guest expectations.”

“Our vision of giving luxuri-ous and comfortable experience has become a reality, providing our guests and travel partners an unrivalled lux-ury vacation experience that embod-ies the Coral Safari brand,” said Gautham Jayaram, Director of Heaven On Ocean Tourism Private Limited.


Korean Air has launched a new codeshare agreement and frequent flyer programme with Jet Airways.

The new codeshare agreement promises to offer great convenience and choice to the passengers trav-elling from India to Incheon, Seoul, through gateway airports in Asian destinations such as Singapore and Bangkok. Passengers will also benefit from the con-nections onto Jet Airways’ daily service to Delhi.

Under the agreement, Korean Air will place its ‘KE’ code on Jet Airways’ 7 to 14 weekly flights from Mumbai and Delhi, to Bangkok and Mumbai-Singapore, and the codeshare routes are expected to be expanded even more by the end of this year. Passengers will benefit from the increased connec-tivity and frequency between Incheon, Seoul and cit-ies in India.

This codeshare will in turn give Korean Air its first daily flight to Delhi which passengers will be able to access via Korean’s own Seoul-Bangkok flights. The Mumbai connections will operate alongside Korean Air’s own thrice-weekly Seoul-Mumbai service.

A new frequent flyer reciprocal partnership

programme is also in the line that will enable mem-bers of both airlines’ frequent flyer programme, SKY-PASS and JetPrivilege, to earn and burn mileage on the entire network of the two airlines.

Korean Air currently operates an A330 aircraft from Incheon to Mumbai three times a week. The flight departs every Monday, Wednesday and Friday from Incheon and every Tuesday, Thursday and Sat-urday from Mumbai.

Korean Air consolidates its presence in India with Jet Airways

Jet to increase Muscat operations

Lufthansa to fly Airbus A350 to Delhi

Jet Airways is set to expand its Middle Eastern network by launching a new daily flight between Delhi and Muscat. The airline will use its two-class Boeing 737-800 aircraft for the new route.

Flights will initially depart Delhi each day at 23:15, arriving in Muscat at 01:30. The return flight will then leave the Omani capital at 02:30 and arrive back in Delhi at 07:00. Timings might later alter slightly with a 23:25 departure from Delhi and a 02:45 return flight from Muscat.

“It is indeed a proud moment for us at Jet Air-ways to launch our maiden international flight between Delhi and Muscat. This is a significant milestone for enhancing the strong ties between India and the Sultanate of Oman. With the launch of this flight, Jet Airways guests from Northern India, SAARC and ASEAN regions will have the option of travelling to Oman via Delhi,” said Gaurang Shetty, Jet’s Senior Vice President of commercial.

Jet Airways will thus operate a total of four daily flights between India and Muscat, includ-ing other daily services from Mumbai, Kochi and Thiruvananthapuram.

Air India to operate direct flights in the New Delhi-Vienna route

Air India introduces Buddhist Trail Air Pass

Air India has announced the launch of non-stop flights to Vienna from New Delhi. Commencing dur-ing early April, the airline would operate flights thrice a week, on Wednesday, Friday and Sunday, to the Austrian capital city, with a B787 aircraft, declared Pankaj Srivastava, Director for Commercial.

The Delhi-Vienna-Delhi flight will have a conve-nient departure at 14:00hrs from Delhi and arrival at Vienna at 18:45hrs. The return flight will have a night departure from Vienna at 22:45hrs and arrive in Delhi at 09:25hrs. The new route would be serviced by the 256-seater Dreamliner Boeing 787-800 plane with 18 business class seats and the rest in economy.

“Air India has taken a conscious decision to grow further in the European market and operate as a dom-inant player on the (new) route,” Srivastava said while announcing the new flight in the presence of Air India CMD Ashwani Lohani.

Air India with codeshare arrangements with Austrian Airlines will replace existing five weekly services to Vienna and will offer connectivity to more than 25 European destinations. This service will provide connectivity to all corners of India and to international destinations like Bangkok, Kathmandu, Colombo and other destinations con-nected to Delhi.

Air India launched Air Pass covering major cities of Buddhist interest in India, Myanmar and Sri Lanka. This is a coupon based scheme for jour-neys originating ex Yangon and Colombo. There is also an option to combine Myanmar, Sri Lanka and India in a single journey.

Launched on March 7, except group travel, the programme is applicable to all types of journeys in economy class. Travellers can book tickets at Air India offices or through travel agents. Tick-ets are valid for 60 days from the start date of the journey. The fares are broadly divided into four schemes: two for flights originating from Myan-mar and two from Sri Lanka.

Scheme 1 offers ex-Yangon six flight coupons for $600 while scheme 2 offer eight ex-Yangon coupons for $800. Schemes 3 and 4 are for flights from Sri Lanka, offering six coupons for $450 or eight coupons for $800.

Lufthansa has chosen Delhi as one its first destinations for the new fleet of Airbus A350 aircraft.

The airline announced that its first 10 A350s will be based at Munich Air-port from January 2017, and the new long-haul jets will be deployed on the airline’s routes to Delhi and Boston.

“We are delighted that we are able to offer the most modern aircraft type to our long-haul passengers flying out from Munich. The A350 also consti-tutes an active step towards noise pro-tection,” said Thomas Winkelmann,

CEO of the Lufthansa Hub Munich.The airline’s Munich-Delhi flights

depart the Bavarian city at 12:00 and arrive in the Indian capital at 23:00. The return services then leave at 00:45 and get back to Munich at 05:30.

A new booking feature introduced by Jet Air-ways allows customers to hold their selected fare for a limited period of time prior to its purchase at a later date. The feature has made Jet the first Indian carrier to have provided the facility of lock-ing rates.

The ‘Fare Lock’ option applies to all Jet flights and can be availed from the website and mobile app. Once a guest selects the Fare Lock option, they will need to pay a nominal fee of `350 (approx. $5.20) for a domestic ticket and ̀ 700 for an international ticket, to retain the available fare. The customer can then

complete the purchase from the online booking plat-form with 72 hours via the Manage Booking feature.

“The launch of Fare Lock demonstrates Jet Air-ways’ continued commitment to the ‘Guest First’ phi-losophy. This unique feature allows guests to have greater flexibility in planning their travel while lock-ing fares in advance of the actual purchase. It will transform the way guests book tickets using our online platforms. With the introduction of Fare Lock, Jet Airways has yet again raised the industry bench-mark for customer experience,” said Gaurang Shetty, Jet’s Senior Vice President of commercial.

Jet launches new online Fare Lock feature for customers

IndiGo gets delivery of A320neo aircraftIndiGo has taken the delivery of its first Airbus A320neo aircraft.

The airline that claims the larg-est domestic market share in the country announced that its first fuel-efficient jet will mark the start of a major roll-out.

“Airbus has confirmed that beginning [in] March 2016, it will deliver 24…A320neo aircraft by March of 2017,” said the airline.

“With the resolution of the deliv-ery of A320neos, IndiGo expects to continue with its strong operating

performance, growth in profitabil-ity and healthy cash generation,” IndiGo President Aditya Ghosh said.

IndiGo placed the largest air-craft order in Indian aviation his-tory in 2015, when it agreed to purchase 250 A320neos worth approximately $26 billion at list prices. IndiGo said its total fleet size, currently numbering around 100 planes, is expected to increase by about 22.4% year-on-year in the 2017 financial year.

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 9 INDIA •

The national carrier, Garuda Indonesia is planning to launch flights connecting Bali to Mumbai. With the objective of tapping into the large honeymoon and Hindu pilgrimage market in India, the airlines may operate charter flights in advance of plans for scheduled departures.

“The Indian market has great potential. There are two strong potential markets in India, those undertaking a honeymoon and those on a religious pilgrimage. The middle to upper classes of India are those that generally go on a religious journey to Bali,” Garuda’s Commercial Director, Handay-ani said.

Scoot to start flights in IndiaSingapore based carrier Scoot is planning to launch its first flights to India, confirmed Scoot’s Country Man-ager Bharath Mahadevan. With operations commenc-ing soon, Scoot is looking at more than one Indian destination.

“We are just waiting for the final approval from avi-ation regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) for flying to India from Singapore. We have all necessary ground handling and technical assistance in India ready to support our flights,” Mahadevan said. Scoot will fly from three cities by end of May includ-ing one south Indian metro and tier two cities in north India, he said.

“We will be offering 15-50% cheaper fares than exist-ing Indian airlines,” Mahadevan added.

With the arrival of Scoot, all five of the Singapore Air-lines Group’ carriers will be operational in the coun-try. Mahadevan aims to attract the leisure and Visiting

Friends and Relative (VFR) segment. “At present only about 15% of passengers travel onward beyond Sin-gapore and we aim to increase it to 40%. Passengers from India will be able to fly on Scoot to Singapore and onward on Singapore Airlines network,” he said.

Vistara announced a 25% increase in flights at the start of the summer 2016 schedule, includ-ing the launch of services to Jammu, Srinagar and Kochi (Cochin). Vistara’s rapidly expanding route network will now cover 15 cities as the air-line increases its weekly flights from 317 to almost 400. By the end of October 2016, the total number of flights will have increased by 85% relative to the current schedule.

Starting April 7, 2016, Vistara will offer direct daily return flights from Delhi to Srinagar and daily same-aircraft flights from Delhi to Jammu via Srinagar, April 9, 2016, onwards. The direct daily return flights from Mumbai to Kochi and daily same-aircraft flights from Delhi to Kochi via Mumbai will commence from April 14, 2016. The new summer schedule has 17 city pairs con-nected through direct (non-stop) flights; 16 addi-tional city pairs connected through ‘via’ flights such as Mumbai to Varanasi, Lucknow, and Bhu-baneshwar and Bengaluru to Guwahati; and over

40 additional single-stop travel options through connecting flights such as Srinagar to Mumbai, Hyderabad and Bhubaneshwar, and Lucknow to Pune and Hyderabad (all via Delhi).

Speaking about the latest network expansion, Phee Teik Yeoh, CEO, Vistara said, “With grow-ing market presence and phenomenal customer uptake, we plan to double our domestic capac-ity this year by offering more flights, destina-tions and increased frequencies to our growing loyal customer base. The addition of Jammu, Sri-nagar and Kochi to our route network, coupled with the introduction of convenient same-day return flights on the Delhi – Bengaluru route in both directions and several new via and connect-ing flight options, represent the first phase of our growth plan this summer as we ramp up utilisa-tion and add new aircraft to our fleet. We believe that these will help us further broaden the appeal of Vistara to our business and leisure customers alike across our network.”

Vistara announces significant service expansion

Garuda Indonesia to establish direct connectivity between Bali and Mumbai

Indian Railways ties up with OYO Rooms to provide online hotel bookings

IRCTC to manage catering service in a phased manner

Indian rail passengers will now be able to book rooms along with their train tickets following a partnership between the Indian Railway Catering & Tourism Cor-poration (IRCTC) and OYO Rooms.

OYO Rooms will power IRCTC’s new hotel book-ing page under the new agreement. Passengers will be offered a choice of approximately 45,000 hotel rooms in more than 170 Indian cities.

“OYO Rooms has propelled the hotel market in India towards new horizon and pioneered the standardisa-tion of affordable hotel-rooms. This partnership con-tributes another chapter to the successful narrative of ‘Made in India’ initiatives and how tech-enabled solu-tions will power the next wave of innovation. We have made the necessary technology integrations and will be actively communicating about this newly available option through e-mailers, information on e-tickets so that our travellers can explore and utilise these ser-vices,” commented IRCTC’s Chairman & Managing Director, Dr A K Manocha.

Abhinav Sinha, OYO Rooms’ Chief Operating Offi-cer said, “We are honoured and delighted to power the hotel booking engine of IRCTC and serve Indian rail-way passengers. With this tie-up, IRCTC customers will have ready access to OYO’s inventory of predictable, standardised and affordable hotel accommodation.”

Minister of State for Railways, Manoj Sinha announced that the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corpo-ration (IRCTC) would begin to manage catering service in a phased manner, as announced in the Rail Budget Speech 2016-17.

In 2015, Sreedhran Committee, set up by the Min-istry of Railways, recommended the transfer of cater-ing services back to IRCTC since IRCTC was setup as an extended arm of the Indian Railways to profession-alise catering services on Indian Railways. It has been decided to give back the catering services to IRCTC in a phased manner with unbundling catering services by creating a distinction primarily between food prep-aration and food distribution. In order to address the

problems faced earlier, it has been decided that there will be no complete handing over of the catering service by IRCTC to private licensees and Zonal Railways will have powers of supervision and monitoring.

Shirdi airport to be operational soon, as AAI approves first landingWith the Airports Authority of India (AAI) giving its green signal, Shirdi airport will be operational in four months after the first flight landed at the air-port from Mumbai. The six-seater chartered plane Piper Seneca belonging to the Bombay Flying Club took off from Juhu in Mumbai at 8.30am and landed at the Shirdi airport in 45 minutes.

The airport is located in Kakdi village, about 100 km from Shirdi on a 1,100-acre plot With a large demand for air connectivity to Shirdi from Mumbai, Hyderabad, Delhi, Bengaluru, Chen-nai and also from other countries, the then Maharashtra government had sanctioned an air-port for. The AAI inspected the landing and the airport facilities. According to the airport devel-opment company, the state government is also try-ing to start the air services to Dubai and Singapore from Shirdi in the first phase.

The total cost of the airport is ̀ 300 crore and till date `200 crore has been used. The state govern-ment has recently approved of the remaining ̀ 100 crore, which will be used for constructing the com-pound wall of the airport and the connecting roads.

Vishwas Patil, Executive Director of the Airport Development Company said, “Saibaba devotees from Dubai and Singapore had asked for the air services to Shirdi. Hence, the government is trying to start the services in the first phase itself. Besides, air services will be provided to Mumbai, Delhi, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Chennai and Ahmedabad as well.”

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 • 10ASIA

Thai Airways increases frequency to 19 flights a week from Delhi to Bangkok

Philippines observes 10.9% increase in foreign tourist arrivals in 2015

Tourism Authority of Thailand projects rise in Indian weddings and honeymoons

According to the Department of Tourism, Philip-pines attracted 5.36 million foreign tourists in 2015, an increase of 10.9% from 2014.

South Korea was the biggest source market last year, providing 1.34 million visitors, followed by the United States with 779,217 visitors. Japan claimed the third spot, providing 495,662 visitors, then China, con-tributing 490,841 visitors, and Australia, with 241,187 arrivals.

For 2015, the international visitor receipts also increased to 227.62 billion pesos ($4.86 billion), 5.92% higher than the 214.88 billion pesos earnings in 2014.

The Department of Tourism’s Secretary Ramon Jimenez Jr noted that the strong performance of the industry may be attributed to the aggressive branding and promotional activities launched in key and emerg-ing markets.

“For 2015, tourism employment is estimated at 4.99 million with a share of 12.7% to national employ-ment, already representing 4.8% growth from 2014,” Jimenez added.

Tourism Authority of Thailand launches new responsive websitesThe Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) has re-launched its main website, www.tourismthailand.org, which has been re-designed and re-developed to provide a user-friendly viewing experience across all devices from desktop computers to mobile phones. Meanwhile, the TAT Newsroom website, www.tatnews.org, also boasts a fresh look with a responsive design.

Dr Yuthasak Supasorn, Governor of TAT said, “In this ever-changing world, TAT is continu-ously developing our strategies and tools to reach as many global travellers as possible to promote

the wide plethora of Thailand’s tourism products and services. Our new-look websites, both featur-ing a responsive design – the latest trend in website development, reflect our intentions to provide all the information and functionality that our travel-lers and media friends require to plan a trip to Thai-land or to learn the latest news and updates on our travel and hospitality industry.”

Re-launched in late 2015, www.tourismthailand.org now features the ‘AIR’ design concept: Application – providing all functionality for a user-friendly viewing experience; Infographic – providing tour-ist information through stunning imagery; and Responsive Design – allowing easy reading and user-friendly navigation across all devices.

Meanwhile, also re-launched in late 2015, the re-developed and updated version of the TAT News-room website, www.tatnews.org, brings its user-friendly viewing experience to the next level with a new UXI design approach. The website has enhanced its ability to support the international media with news and updates on Thailand’s travel and hospitality industry, bearing in mind: U (user) – user behaviours and devices used to access the web-site’s news and updates; X (experience) – friendly design to create a first impression and allow easy navigation for international media; and I (interface design) – friendly functionality for easy reading and navigation across all devices.

Thai Airways operates additional daylight flight TG324-TG323, increasing frequency to 19 flights a week. The additional day flight offers greater options to passengers travelling to Australia and Auckland. Flying at three different time slots, Thai offers conve-nience and flexibility to passengers. Thai is currently operating from six cities in India i.e. Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Hyderabad, Chennai and Bengaluru offer-ing 52 flights a week. We also operate seasonal flights from Gaya and Varanasi between October-March.

“It is our endeavour to ensure that our passen-gers enjoy a comfortable and happy journey on Thai. We are constantly working to improve our service as per changing demands and customer’s expecta-tions, from upgrading aircraft to world class ground services at Suvarnabhumi airport, changing F&B options as per service route requirements, entertain-ment and shopping on board; convenience of web purchase and online services, Thai is dedicated to customer satisfaction,” said Viset Sontichai, Direc-tor, Thai Airways for India Subcontinent.

Thailand is forecasting a huge growth in the num-ber of Indian weddings and honeymoons following an annual FAM trip organised for wedding planners from major Indian cities.

A total of 17 planners from Mumbai, New Delhi, Kolkata, Jaipur, Chandigarh and Bengaluru were invited for this year’s trip, which covered Bangkok, Phuket, Khao Lak, Kanchanaburi, Hua Hin, Rayong and Pattaya. It was the third such trip organised in as many years.

The visit was between March 21-27, 2016, ended with a briefing symposium and table-top opportunity for business networking between the Indian wedding planners and 31 Thai hotels together with 23 wedding service and attractions keen to cater to the market.

Indian wedding planners find that Thailand is per-fect for the growing number of destination weddings thanks to airline accessibility, great Thai hospitality, affordability of luxury, strong cultural connections, and products and services that deliver the highest standards of excellence and attention to detail.

Thailand hosts about 300 weddings from India every year, or roughly one event every two days. Each wedding party comprises between 100-600 people, covers three to six days, with budgets ranging from 10 million Baht to 50 million Baht per event.

Srisuda Wannapinyosak, Deputy Governor for International Marketing – Asia and South Pacific, Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) said, “This is still only scratching the surface of the market poten-tial. An estimated 15 million weddings are held in India every year with an overall expenditure of $60 billion. With the vast majority of the Indian population still in their 20s, many more weddings will come up in the years ahead.”

Soraya Homchuen, Director, TAT Mumbai Office, gave a detailed briefing to the FAM trip participants on the extensive range of hotels, restaurants, deluxe shopping malls, convention centres and other attrac-tions and facilities that the Indian wedding planners can present to their clients.

Air Asia has launched the first ever daily direct flight from Kochi to Bangkok Don Mueang start-ing from May 17, 2016.

Soraya Homchuen, TAT Director of Mumbai said, “We are very excited to add a new connection for Indian visitors to Thailand. Now those resid-ing in South India can fly to Bangkok from Kochi in addition to Bengaluru, Chennai and Hyderabad.”

She went on to elaborate, “In 2015, arrivals to Thailand from India reached 1,069,149 travellers, making India the 6th largest group of travellers to our country. Apart from delicious Thai cuisine, we are keen to showcase Thai hospitality and various attractions nationwide. Beyond Bangkok’s temples, shopping malls and nightlife, there is still much to explore. We invite you to visit our famous beaches in southern Thailand and relax among the natu-ral landscape and green mountains of northern Thailand.”

From Bangkok, AirAsia passengers can conve-niently connect to Phuket, Krabi, Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai.

Additionally, AirAsia X has started a new direct route between Kuala Lumpur and Delhi, which would now operate four times a week, with flights departing KLIA every Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday at 19:00 and arriving in Delhi at 22:00. The return services would depart the Indian cap-ital at 23:15, arriving back into KL at 07:30 the next morning. The airline would be flying its 377-seat, two-class Airbus A330-300 aircraft along the route.

Air Asia increases its connectivity to India

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 11 asia •

Japan attracts two million visitors during Sapporo Snow Festival

Vietnam welcomes its first surge of foreign arrivals in 2016Hundreds of foreign tourists arrived in Vietnam in 2016, promising a busy season for the tourism industry in the Year of Monkey.

The southern hub of Ho Chi Minh City welcomed the first international delegation of over 500 visitors from Japan and China’s Taiwan. The city’s Department of Tourism, in conjunction with the Municipal Tourism Association (HTA) and the national flag carrier Vietnam

Airlines, held a ceremony to welcome the first visitors.The foreign holidaymakers were greeted with Viet-

namese tea and coffee at the Tan Son Nhat international airport and received numerous gifts such as ‘non la’ (palm-leaf conical hat) tea and coffee.

Deputy Director of the Municipal Department of Tourism, La Quoc Khanh said the ceremony put the first note for a series of events in the 2016 tourism festival, which also include an ‘ao dai’ (Vietnamese traditional dress) show, southern food and fruit festivals.

He added that the ceremony was aimed at promoting the image of the city as an attractive, safe and friendly destination for foreign tourists.

Ho Chi Minh City welcomed nearly 4.6 million inter-national vacationers in 2015, a year-on-year increase of 4.6%. In 2016, the southern hub strives to welcome 5.1 million foreign tourists and 21.8 domestic ones.

The first day of the New Year also saw the central coastal city of Da Nang welcome the first 180 foreign visitors at the international airport. In 2016, it aims to welcome over 5.1 million visitors, including 1.32 million from abroad.

With record Indian visitors last year, Singapore expects modest growth in 2016For 2016, Singapore Tourism Board (STB) forecasts tourism receipts to be in the range of S$22.0 to $22.4 billion (0 – 2%) and international visitor arrivals in the range of 15.2 to 15.7 million (0 – 3%). Singapore, last year, recorded a growth in visitor arrivals by 0.9%, with more than one million Indian travellers visiting to cel-ebrate the Golden Jubilee year.

Singapore Tourism Board (STB) Chief Executive, Lionel Yeo said, “We are encouraged by the upturn in visitor arrivals from May onwards that led to a positive

growth for the whole of 2015. Of particular note is the two percent growth in leisure visitor arrivals in 2015, which helped offset the decline in BTMICE visitor arrivals. This shows that Singapore remains attrac-tive as a leisure destination.”

By international visitor arrivals, the top growth markets for 2015 visitor arrivals were China (+22%), India (+7%), South Korea (+7%) and Taiwan (+12%). Notably, there were more visitor arrivals from both Tier I and Tier II cities in China and India, where STB had intensified its marketing and channel develop-ment efforts. Singapore Tourism Board announced that the nation recorded over one million visitor arriv-als from India in 2015, marking a year-on-year growth of 7.4% in visitor arrivals.

Riding on the international attention that Singa-pore garnered for its Golden Jubilee year, STB ampli-fied its marketing efforts by collaborating with tourism industry stakeholders to launch a S$20 million Golden Jubilee global marketing campaign in seven key mar-kets. The Board also put in place strategic partnerships with Changi Airport Group, Singapore Airlines, and TripAdvisor to promote Singapore as the destination of choice. Over two million people including overseas tour-

ists visited the three sites in Sapporo City where rows of small and large snow statues were on dis-play during the Sapporo Snow Festival. The fes-tival went on for seven days, starting in the sec-ond week of February (February 5 – February 11). Odori Park which served as the main venue, is located in the city centre, and a space extending 1.5 km got transformed into a snow museum. Inter-national Square (Nishi 11 chome, Odori) became the stage for the International Snow Statue Con-test. Every year more than 10 teams compete from all over the world. The snow statues were lit-up which attracted a large number of tourists from around the world.

Moreover, the ice sculptures displayed at the Susukino Site, which is also a famous nightspot district, created a truly fantastic world. Here, one could discover unique works with Hokkaido del-icacies such as crab, cuttlefish and salmon frozen inside the ice.

The year 2006 marked the opening of Sapporo Satorando, a park designed on the theme of agri-culture. In addition to attractions for children, such as the 100 m long slide and the snow maze, visitors could also experience flying in hot-air bal-loons and sliding down snowfields on snow raft-ing boards.

As tourism in Nepal is mainly confined to the cen-tral part of the country such as Kathmandu and Chitwan, the Nepal Tourism Board (NTB) is aim-ing to promote the lesser-explored western region in India.

“The unique Tharu culture in the Terai, Hindu culture in the mid-mountains and Tibetan cul-ture in the northern part dominates the far west-ern region of Nepal. NTB along with Nepal Associ-ation of Tour and Travel Agents (NATTA) is taking the lead in promoting the region among the Indian tourists,” said Mani Raj Lamichhane, Head - Tour-ism Products & Resources Development, Nepal Tourism Board.

Post the earthquake in Nepal in last April, NTB is promoting this year as the ‘Year of Survival’ and 2017 as the ‘Year of Revival’ to clear the myths around the calamity. Lamichhane added that are targeting at least 20% growth in 2016 as compared to the previous year.

“With India being the topmost source market for Nepal Tourism, along with Nepal Airlines we plan to participate in all travel trade marts across India, with a key focus in Delhi, Mumbai and Bengaluru markets. Trade and media familiarisation tours will also be conducted round the year to clear the myths related to travel to Nepal and promote newer itiner-aries,” he informed.

Nepal Tourism declares 2016 Year of Survival, focus on India market with lesser explored destination

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 • 12MIDDLE EAST

Etihad signs agreement with Luggage Logistics for baggage management

Abu Dhabi Tourism & Culture Authority updates Visit Abu Dhabi mobile app

Lebanon continues development in its tourism and travel industryAmid continuing regional tension, the Levant or East-ern Mediterranean witnessed continuous development in its tourism and travel industry. Lebanon registered an incremental trend in figures of tourism spending, vat refunds and airport arrivals.

Lebanon’s hotel occupancy had a year-on-year increase during the months of January and February 2016, although the average room rate was set to meet the market seasonal demand.

Beirut welcomed a unique and live performance of the Disney award-winning movie, Frozen, on the main Biel exhibition centre stage that held thousands of par-ents who shared the beautiful experience with their children.

Mostly Shakespeare was one of many scheduled per-formances within the Al-Bustan International Festival of Music & the Performing Arts.

Several options are available for accommodation, that range from B&B homestays in Beirut and beyond, to luxurious, lavish properties ready to cater to all travellers.

Positive experiences are the mottos in Lebanon,

where one can travel to meditate, attend social events, practice active sports, and visit natural wonders.

Lebanon tourism wants to be an ideal destination for leisure attractions with its varied landscape and mild climate, besides the extreme richness of its cultural and historic patrimony.

Qatar Airways A350 aircraft makes its first entry in IndiaQatar Airways marked its return to the India Aviation International Exhibition and Conference with the dis-play of its A350 new-generation aircraft for medium to long-haul operations, making its first public appearance in India. The ultra-modern aircraft was able to grab the attention of visitors and VIPs with its custom-designed interiors and innovative design.

President of India, Pranab Mukherjee, inaugurated the fifth edition of India Aviation, the country’s largest exhibition and conference on civil aviation, which was held in Hyderabad recently. Also present on the occa-sion was Ashok Gajapathi Raju Pusapati, Indian Union Minister for Civil Aviation.

Qatar Airways, the global launch customer of the A350, just celebrated one year of operations with the technologically advanced aircraft. The airline’s A350

now flies to four destinations – Frankfurt, Munich, Phil-adelphia and Singapore – across three continents: Asia, Europe and North America. Soon, the aircraft would be flying to the upcoming new routes of Adelaide and Bos-ton, and also the second daily flight to New York.

H.E. Al Baker said, “It gives us immense pride to be a part of India Aviation 2016 and we are delighted to showcase our A350 for the first time here. We remain committed to India and look forward to developing our footprint to give the Indian travelling public a wide choice of services. This will expand opportunities for business and tourism, and create new jobs in aviation and allied industries.”

Like Qatar, he said, the Indian economy is experienc-ing robust growth. “Qatar Airways serves more than 150 destinations with award-winning service, and we serve more cities in India than any other country in our net-work. We fly to 13 Indian cities operating 102 passenger flights and 30 freighter flights every week. This market will always be a key part of our growth strategy, and we look forward to growing our presence in India.”

Etihad Airways has announced an agreement with Luggage Logistics to transform the end-to-end bag-gage management process across the airline’s global airport network.

Luggage Logistics’ advanced Baggage Manage-ment System (BMS) will enable Etihad Airways to significantly improve the delivery of guests’ luggage to their destination on time. It will also help the air-line to easily track where bags are at any point along the journey, throughout its global operation.

BMS will integrate with flight schedules and other key passenger information and departure control systems. This will increase the speed at which Etihad Airways’ guest bags can be identified and transferred from the aircraft to the airport terminal facilities onto connecting flights, keeping departures on schedule and improving the on-time performance of its flights.

Geert W Boven, Etihad Airways’ Senior Vice President Airport Services, said, “The partnership with Luggage Logistics will greatly improve the iden-tification, management and transfer control of guest baggage across our global airport network including at our Abu Dhabi base. The new baggage manage-ment solution will enhance the guest experience by reducing lost or misplaced luggage, minimise delays commonly associated with baggage management, while optimising our flight operations.”

Abu Dhabi Tourism & Culture Authority (TCA Abu Dhabi) has released a new, improved version of its Visit Abu Dhabi mobile application. The latest Visit Abu Dhabi app version that lets users to gain instant access to all that’s new in the emirate via their mobile phones is now live and features several upgrades and enhancements, as TCA Abu Dhabi continues to improve the functionality of the service.

Version 4.0 of the app allows access to the same content at the Authority’s destination portal VisitAbuDhabi.ae and is available for iPhone, Android & Windows Phone. The app will fur-ther feature enhancements to make it a more user-friendly experience.

“We’ve listened carefully to all your feedback and our app has been completely redesigned from top to bottom following the latest user experience trends to make the whole experience even more immer-sive and easy to use,” said Mouza Al Shamsi, Act-ing Executive Director of Marketing and Communi-cations at TCA Abu Dhabi. “The entire key features that you’re familiar with from our previous versions are still present but now they’re even faster, smarter and bursting with functionality.”

Oman received 299,022 Indian arrivals last year record-ing 17% growth in 2015 over 2014. Oman’s National Cen-tre for Statistics and Information (NCSI) released the arrival figures which highlight an increase in inbound numbers from India. The statistics also reflect a growth of 60% in Indian arrivals to Oman in the last five years.

Speaking on the increase, Lubaina Sheerazi, India Representative, Ministry of Tourism, Oman said, “The increase is very encouraging and reflects all the hard work we have put in promoting and marketing the destination in India. Since 2014, we started promot-ing Oman as an ideal wedding destination for Indians as Muscat is close to India. Our efforts were rewarded as we witnessed several large-scale weddings take place in the last two years. From Sonam Kapoor to diamond merchants in Surat and NRI’s, several Indi-ans are now visiting Oman for the purpose of destina-tion weddings. This has contributed significantly to our arrival numbers. MICE tourism in Oman has also seen an increase and to attract more MICE activities this year, our efforts are aimed at increasing interac-tions with tour operators and corporates.”

As a country surrounded by mighty mountains, valleys, deserts and beaches, Oman is an excellent short-haul destination from India. “To attract more tourists from India, we are looking at promoting var-ious activities. We have observed over the years that Indian travellers don’t travel just for sight-seeing and shopping anymore. More young people are now trav-elling who prefer active holidays and Oman has a lot to offer to these travellers. From canyoning to deep sea

diving, from sailing to golfing, Oman is a treat to any-one seeking an outdoor holiday,” Sheerazi added.

Oman has seen several major developments in the country over the years and some properties in the pipe-line to be opened in 2016 include: The Anantara Jabal Al Akhdar Resort, a rare jewel in the rocky contours of the vast Saiq Plateau on Oman’s fabled Green Moun-tain, magnificently perched almost 3,000 m above sea level on the curving rim of a great canyon; the Anan-tara Salalah Resort, situated between a beach and nat-ural lagoon on the south coast of Dhofar in Salalah, Oman; The Kempinski Hotel and Residences at Mus-cat’s Al Mouj resort. Muscat has seen recent growth in the MICE market and this is anticipated to grow even faster with the opening of the new Oman Convention and Exhibition centre. The 22,000 m facility will be complemented with four hotels with a total of 1,000 rooms and a business park.

Oman records 17% increase in Indian arrivals in 2015

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 • 13europe

With Ireland undertaking full-fledged promotional efforts in India, the CEO of Tourism Ireland, Niall Gibbons made his first visit to the country.

In India, Gibbons announced Tourism Ireland’s sponsorship of the Irish cricket teams for the ICC T20 Cricket World Cup. The kits of both men and women’s team carry the logo of Tourism Ireland, providing greater exposure for the destination in the Indian market.

“Sport-related tourism has emerged as a very significant element in world tourism in recent years. Our sponsorship of the team in this year’s ICC T20 Cricket World Cup offers us a superb opportunity to highlight the island of Ireland,” said Gibbons.

The CEO pointed out that Ireland had a 25% increase in the Indian tourist arrivals over the last few years. This growth had been fuelled by the recently-launched British-Irish Visa Scheme which makes it easier to visit both Ireland and the UK in a single trip. There is also increased access to the country via the Middle East, through Etihad Air-ways’ and Emirates’ flights to Dublin.

This year, Tourism Ireland plans to engage with the Indian travel trade and media through FAM trips, workshops and seminars, and through the ‘Ireland Specialists’ online travel trade training programme.

Netherlands becomes the new European gateway for Jet Airways via Amsterdam

Scotland becomes India Ready

Jet Airways (India) Ltd has launched daily non-stop flights from Delhi and Mumbai to Schiphol Amster-dam Airport, increasing connectivity between India, Europe and North America. In addition, Jet Airways would also operate a daily flight to Toronto from Amsterdam. Schedules of all three flights have been planned to allow quick, convenient and seamless connections between India and Toronto via Amster-dam, the airline said. With this Jet Airways is set to make Netherlands its new European gateway.

In the wake of Jet’s connectivity to Amsterdam, Netherlands Board of Tourism & Conventions (NBTC) Holland Marketing has renewed their des-tination marketing activities in the Indian market with new vigour.

Jos Vranken, MD, NBTC Holland Marketing explained they would embark on a joint destination marketing campaign in the market with Jet Airways and Schiphol Amsterdam Airport. Simultaneously, NBTC would start travel trade marketing and press and PR activities. “We also have plans to organise trade and media familiarisation trips,” he said.

Vranken informed that the communication strat-egy would be to position ‘Holland as a City’ in the Indian market and the focus would be to target fam-ily market, luxury travellers and wedding and hon-eymoon segments from India.

Scotland is gearing up to be positioned as an ‘India ready’ destination after Scottish tourism businesses were trained through a series of industry-led activi-ties by the national tourism organisation.

VisitScotland representatives recently met with key tour operators, leading tourism industry fig-ures and strategic partners at a roundtable event in Mumbai.

Organised by the tourism body, the forum formed part of a five-day India Business Development Mis-sion in partnership with Etihad Airways, taking place in Mumbai, Chandigarh and Delhi.

VisitScotland was joined in India by seven

industry partners for a series of trade and network-ing events across the country.

India is the 14th largest international market for expenditure in Scotland and the ninth for number of nights. Edinburgh is the third most visited city in the UK for Indian visitors, with Glasgow and Inverness also top destinations. Scotland appeals to India through its dramatic landscapes and natural beauty, its cities, whisky and golf. Film tourism is another key driver, with around 24 Bollywood movies having been filmed in Scotland and whose locations are fea-tured in a special online map, Bollywood Scotland, produced by VisitScotland.

Tourism in Vienna recorded 14.3 million visitor over-nights in 2015, 5.9% more than that of 2014, making it its best year ever. Between December 2014 to Decem-ber 2015, Vienna’s accommodation capacity increased by 2,840 to 64,200 beds, whilst room occupancy was up to 72%. “Approximately 82% of Vienna’s overnights in 2015 were international. Our strategy of reducing our dependence on individual markets and targeting spe-cific growth and promising markets has paid off,” said Director of Tourism, Norbert Kettner.

Vienna aims to achieve an overnight figure of 18 mil-lion by 2020.

In 2015, Vienna’s Top 10 markets were once again headed by Germany with 2,783,000 bednights (+5%), fol-lowed by Austria (2,617,000 bednights, +5%), the USA (843,000, +13%), Italy (750,000, +8%) and the United Kingdom (588,000, +18%). Places 6 to 10 were taken

by Spain (437,000, +13%), Switzerland (435,000, +9%), Russia (408,000, -32%), France (371,000, +2%) and Japan (286,000, -4%). Vienna also experienced strong growth from China (285,000 overnights, +21%), the Arab coun-tries in Asia (198,000 overnights, +48%), South Korea (187,000, +19%), Australia (164,000, +10%), Turkey (148,000, +15%), the United Arab Emirates (123,000, +45%) and India (90,000).

Austria’s capital Vienna witnesses record tourism in 2015

Tourism Ireland sponsors Irish Cricket Teams for ICC T20 World Cup

Bosnia to woo Indian travellers with Air Arabia connectivityBosnia and Herzegovina recently promoted their respective destinations in Mumbai with the aim of tap-ping into India as a potential tourism source market.

The event was graced by the presence of Dr Sabit Subasic, Ambassador, Embassy of Bosnia and Herze-govina; Imtiaz Ali, Bollywood Director; Suhas Man-tri, Chairman, Mantri Constructions; Sachin Nene, Regional Manager-India, Air Arabia and many other delegates from the film industry and travel trade.

Subasic said, “As far as tourism is concerned, India has emerged as an important market for Bosnia. People of India should know that Bosnia is a beautiful coun-try and can offer everything to tourists. It can become a popular destination for MICE, film shooting, leisure etc.” He further said that Bosnia is a peaceful coun-try and 70% of the country is covered by forests. “We are not targeting any particular city or region of India. Whichever Indian city seems promising, we will mar-ket Bosnia there. We are here in Mumbai because we feel the city has tremendous potential to market our product.”

Visit to Bosnia will become even more convenient for Indian travellers now with Air Arabia connecting flights from Sharjah to Sarajevo. Nene explained, “Bos-nia is very good destination for leisure and MICE and

Indian tourists always like to explore new destinations across the world. Though Bosnia is not far from India, it remains an unexplored destination. Now, we will have very good connectivity via Sharjah from 13 cities of India. With this, Indians will have to pay nominal price to visit Bosnia and can explore the destination. I am sure footfalls from India to Bosnia will increase with the introduction of the flight.”

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 14 • EUROPE

In 2015, more people opted to stay in hotels and hostels in Luxembourg than the year before, with hotels record-ing their best performance ever.

As per the new figures released by the Tourism Min-istry, Luxembourg hotels recorded 2.7 million overnight stays, partly but not only driven by the fact that Luxem-bourg hosted the Presidency of the Council of the Euro-

pean Union from August to December.Hotels recorded a 1.4% growth in overnight stays,

while hostels saw the number of overnight stays rise by 3.5% compared to 2014, with well over half of hotel stays linked to business tourism.

With 800,000 overnight stays, campsites recorded a -1.3% decline from 2014, which was deemed an excep-tional year. The Tourism Ministry said that this repre-sented an emerging sector, particularly with the rise of “glamping” (so-called glamorous camping).

More than a third of campsite customers were first-time visitors to Luxembourg, which the Ministry said attested to the success of its promotional campaigns abroad.

Hostels recorded their highest number of overnight stays since 2007 (when Luxembourg was a European Cultural Capital), with occupancy at 73.2% nationally.

This positive result was due to a growth in the num-ber of French customers (up 13%), followed by Belgians (up nine percent).

Concerning travellers from outside of Europe, Amer-icans were the most likely to stay in Luxembourg hos-tels last year (up 14.9%), followed by Japanese (up 11.2%).

Cyprus has recorded 2015 as the best year for its tourism sector since 2001. The country witnessed a decade-high surge of 2.65 million tourist arrivals, that is, an 8.9% jump over that of 2014.

There has been a 4.4% hike in the key tourism revenue. Total tourism income on the Mediterranean holiday island reached €2.11 billion last year from €2.02 billion in 2014.

The island’s biggest market, Britain spiked more than 19%. December alone accounts for an increase in revenue by 20%, from €43.7 million in 2014 to 52.6 million. Leba-nese were the biggest spenders in December at an aver-age €136.74 a day, while the Swedes were the most frugal at €31.14. This growth in 2015, following nearly four years of recession, can be attributed to a €10 billion international rescue package and insolvent banks in March 2013.

Tourism revenue contributes around 12% of the EU state’s GDP.

Furthering its efforts to attract tourists, Cyprus has launched a new website called www.visitcyprus.com. The consumer-friendly site facilitates search, based on individ-ual interests. Besides practical information, the site pro-vides daily weather updates, an interactive map and indi-vidual sections on each of the main tourist spots.

Cyprus Tourism Organisation (CTO) has also appointed a special agency to manage its social media cam-paign regularly, which encompasses facebook, twitter, ins-tagram and pinterest.

Orestis Rossides, Director of the CTO UK office, said, “We hope our trade partners will find our new website a useful tool in updating their knowledge on Cyprus and that it will assist them in selling the island.”

Turkey updates visa process with online pre-application system

Luxembourg witnesses hotel overnight stays peak in 2015

In line with the procedure observed by Schengan countries and to make it transparent, Turkey has updated its visa application process for various sub categories. For this reason, the Turkish Ministry of External Affairs has come up with ‘pre-applica-tion system for Turkish Sticker Visa’ system which will require applicants to fill basic details and agree to the terms and agreements online. “Travel agents may enter the details, but the application form needs to be signed by the applicant. Applicants will upload their biometric photograph, income proof, flight res-ervation, hotel bookings and other supporting doc-uments online, which after uploading successfully will be given a confirmation and a physical appli-cation form to be printed and signed by the appli-cant,” the Consulate General of The Republic of Tur-key said.

One can seek an appointment online and a travel agent/applicant can visit the Consulate and submit all documents with the passport and make payment. Applicants will have the option to submit their pho-tograph online. However, the online pre-application system is different from the e-visa system.

Addtionally, Turkey has witnessed a growth in tourist arrivals from the Indian market. In 2013, the country welcomed 95,000 nationals from India, and in 2015, the figure touched 140,000. “We expect a lot of diplomatic traffic between two countries this year. We expect changes at foreign secretary levels, and hopefully a bilateral agreement. We are hope-ful of policy changes and Turkey being offered Visa on Arrival by India,” said Erdal Sabri Ergen, Con-sul General, Turkish Consulate General in Mumbai.

Transport for London (TfL) has introduced world’s first zero-emission, long-range, all-electric BYD Double-Decker buses into revenue service routes. TfL celebrated the decision to deploy its first all-electric double decker buses with a special ceremony at London city hall with London’s Deputy Mayor of Environment and Energy, Matthew Pencharz for-mally receiving the first bus from BYD Europe.

“It’s a very exciting moment that this is happen-ing here,” said Matthew Pencharz. “The running costs are much lower and some of the maintenance and operations costs are much lower on the buses. Also, these [buses] are zero-emission, zero-tail-pipe-pollution and that is a huge benefit for Lon-doners.” TfL is putting five of the all-electric double decker buses on Route 98 operated on behalf of TfL by Metroline. Route 98 was chosen given its status as a pollution hotspot in the city.

TfL and Metroline would be receiving support from BYD with the installation of fast charging equipment at Metroline’s Willesden Bus Garage in north London. In addition, BYD would also pro-vide driver training for the bus operators. BYD has designed and developed the vehicles to Transport of London’s specifications. The five buses scheduled for deployment are more than 33 feet long and fea-ture air conditioning, seats for 54 passengers with space for 27 standing passengers (81 total).

“BYD is pleased to partner with Transport for London to provide these zero-emission, advanced technology buses that will help improve air qual-ity in the greater London area and will also provide costs savings,” said Isbrand Ho. “TfL challenged us

to develop a clean, all-electric bus that would meet their service requirements, and we’ve done just that. I hope other transport agencies take note of TfL’s leadership and see that there are no barriers to deploying all-electric buses into service in today’s market.”

The buses are outfitted with BYD-designed and built Iron-Phosphate batteries, delivering 345 kWh of power that come with a Industry-benchmark 12 year battery warranty. The batteries can power the bus for over 24 hours and up to 190 miles of typi-cal urban driving on the service routes with a sin-gle daily recharging requiring only four hours. TfL plans to charge the buses overnight using low-cost, off-peak electricity to provide additional cost savings.

London unveils first all-electric, long-range double-decker busTourism in Cyprus records 4.4% increase in revenue in 2015

Heathrow will develop new iconic automated pods for public trials this summer in collaboration with Westfield Sportscars, and Oxbotica. The companies will develop pods using entirely British engineering and software capa-bilities. These will be capable of fully autonomous opera-tion on London streets as part of the GATEway driverless car project in the Royal Borough of Greenwich.

The companies will develop the existing ‘Ultra pods’ currently in service at Heathrow airport. Led by Westfield Sportcars, these pods will now be adapted to navigate the streets of Greenwich without the need for dedicated tracks.

As the vehicle integrator and manufacturer of pods, Westfield will be responsible for the design and testing of the vehicles in accordance with the current type approval requirements. Heathrow Enterprises will look after vehi-cle software engineering while Oxbotica will be deploying its vertically integrated autonomy solution, which includes mapping, localisation, perception and trajectory planning, to enable the safe operation of fully driverless shuttles in Greenwich. It will also implement an innovative cloud-based shuttle management system, enabling the shuttles to operate as part of a synchronised, self-governing eco-system, complete with smartphone booking applications, monitoring and reporting.

Steve Chambers, Director of Engineering and Asset Management at Heathrow said, “The GATEway Project is a fantastic opportunity to seize on the potential of our leading-edge ‘Ultra POD’ technology, which has already removed 70,000 bus journeys a year from Heathrow roads and the equivalent of 100 tonnes of carbon dioxide a year.”

The GATEway project (Greenwich Automated Trans-port Environment) is an €8 million project jointly funded by Innovate UK and industry. Led by TRL, which has over 50 years of experience in vehicle automation, the project will investigate public perception, reaction and engage-ment with a range of different types of automated vehicles.

Heathrow airport to launch fully automated pods

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 • 15americas

Costa Rica welcomed record visitors in 2015

Bolivia to offer unique tourist attractions

Mexico witnesses 32 million tourists in 2015

Bolivia is synonymous with diversity: diverse geo-graphic land, mixed cultures, varied climate, sunshine every day in the winter and many beautiful attractions, making Bolivia a hard-to-match destination.

One of the most surreal landscapes, Salar De Uyuni is the largest salt flat in the world that can even be seen from space. Exploring the amazing empty white land-scape is an incredible experience and a must-do while in Bolivia. During seasonal floods, one can witness the splendour and beauty of the site as the water on the salt looks like the largest mirror, reflecting the sky.

A major attraction for tourists visiting the destina-tion is Carnaval De Oruro, a folkloric event that takes place between February and March. It was declared a Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage

of Humanity by UNESCO. Featuring music, dance, colours and crafts, it is highlighted by a ceremonial parade lasting 20 hours, covering four kilometres and involving around 20,000 dancers and 10,000 musicians. The carnival reinforces the cultural identity of the com-munity and attracts more than 100,000 visitors. It is one of the most interesting carnivals in South America, dis-playing spectacular folk dances, extravagant costumes and lively music.

Mexico recorded 32 million tourist arrivals in 2015, making the Aztec nation the 10th most popular des-tination in the world.

The tourism sector, that accounts for 8.5% of the country’s GDP, is growing faster than the economy as a whole, said Tourism Secretary Enrique de la Madrid.

The number of international visitors has increased by 37% since the start of President Enrique Pena Nieto’s administration in December 2012. Inter-national visitors last year had chosen Mexico City, Cancun and Acapulco as the top destinations. The arrivals were boosted by special events such as the Mexico Grand Prix, which brought 366,174 specta-tors to the capital.

The expansion has resulted in the creation of 800,000 direct jobs and another 1.2 million indirect jobs over the last 10 years.

Costa Rica received a record number of 2,665,000 visitors in 2015, according to the Insti-tuto Costarricense de Turismo (ICT) – Tourism Board, registering a growth of 5.5% over 2014. The tourism sector generated $2.9 billion dol-lars in revenue, up nine percent in 2015 over the previous year, 2014.

The United States continues to be the main market for tourists in Costa Rica with a total of 1,077,044 tourists arriving from the country.

Tourism Minister, Mauricio Ventura, high-lighted the outstanding performance of the tourism sector, explaining tourism to be the engine that drives national economy.

The outlook for 2016, according to Ventura, is a similar growth in income and number of vaca-tioners choosing Costa Rica.

Tourism in the island of Puerto Rico has reported signifi-cant accomplishments.

“In the last fiscal year we added approximately 500 hotels rooms to our offerings, which resulted in a 73% hotel occupancy rate, a two percent increase throughout the year. In the past three years, 829 rooms were added, repre-senting a 54% increase compared to 2012. With the arrival of new airlines, including Air Europa, Condor and Norwe-gian Air, we now offer direct flights to major European cit-ies such as Madrid, Frankfurt and Oslo,” explained Puerto Rico Governor Alejandro García Padilla.

Puerto Rico has emerged as one of the most competi-tive markets in the region with considerable investment in specialised industries such as pharmaceuticals, biotech-nology, electronics and information technology, among others.

Tourism in Puerto Rico endeavours to boost traffic

Canada records 24% increase in Indian tourist arrivals in 2015Canada had witnessed a remarkable 24% growth in Indian tourist arrivals in October 2015 as compared to the same month in 2014. Around 169,744 Indian tour-ists have visited Canada from January to October 2015.

“A rise in 24% arrivals from India proves that Indi-ans are now looking at exploring Canada for its exclu-sivity. In 2015, we promoted Canada extensively with the travel trade as well as consumers. We recently were awarded as the Best NTO at North India Travel Awards. It makes us really proud and we hope to continue with such and much more achievements in 2016,” said San-Jeet, India Representative - Destination Canada.

Appreciating the rise in numbers, key industry players like Guldeep Singh Sahni, President, OTOAI and Managing Director, Weldon Tours & Travels remarked, “Canada is one of the most sought-after long haul destinations from India. 24% growth in tourist traffic to Canada is a very good sign. A lot of queries came from family and honeymoon travellers. Hats off to the Destination Canada team for the

wonderful work they did.”India is Canada’s 10th largest overseas market which

makes it an attractive key market. The CAN+ Visa pro-gramme in India has eased and fast-tracked the visa process for travellers going to Canada, fostering the

India market and boosting the count of leisure trav-ellers. Canada has captured a greater share of India’s long-haul outbound market over the past few years. With strong arrivals from India, Canada’s tourism sec-tor continues to experience steady growth.

www.ttfotm.com

India’s Biggest Travel Show Network

ScheduleParticipation Package

Add 10% for Corner, 20% for Peninsula and 30% for Island Stand. Add 25% premium for Extra Upper Floor Area, if any.

Add Co-exhibitor Cost : Rs. 5000/- per co-exhibitor.

* Service Tax extra.

* Payment is due at the time of booking.

2016

2017

To book your vantage stand at TTF write us to [email protected] or visit www.ttfotm.com

With more than 2500 Exhibitors from 79 countries and 36 Indian States / UTs, and more than 186,000 visitors combined, TTF is the largest network of travel trade show in India.

International/NTOsNationalRate / sq m :

A. Kolkata : ` 21,500* USD 325*B. Hyderabad : ` 21,500* USD 325*C. Ahmedabad : ` 21,500* USD 325*D. Surat : ` 21,500* USD 325*E. Mumbai : ` 21,500* USD 325*F. Pune : ` 21,500* USD 325*G. Chennai : ` 21,500* USD 325*H. Bengaluru : ` 21,500* USD 325*I. OTM Mumbai : ` 23,500* USD 395*J. New Delhi : ` 21,500* USD 325*

Kolkata : 8, 9, 10 JulyHyderabad : 15, 16, 17 JulyAhmedabad : 2, 3, 4 SeptSurat : 9, 10, 11 SeptMumbai : 16, 17, 18 SeptPune : 23, 24, 25 Sept

Chennai : 6, 7, 8 JanBengaluru : 13, 14, 15 JanOTM Mumbai : 21, 22, 23 FebNew Delhi : 27, 28 Feb, 1 March

TTF is India's leading trade show for the travel and tourism industry. Since 1989, it provides an annual opportunity for organisations from India and abroad to showcase their products and services to a large cross-section of the travel trade and consumers, across major markets in India.

To book your vantage stand at OTM write to us at [email protected] or visit www.otm.co.in.

Participation Package

* Service Tax extra* Payment is due at the time of booking# Early Bird Offer is strictly as per date of payment*** 3 year firm rate contract on the basis of negotiated advance payment terms

Tariff *#Early Bird Offer *

Before 30th June 2016 1st July to 30th Nov 2016

OTM Mumbai US$ 395 /sq m US$ 295 /sq m US$ 345 /sq m

Firm contract for 3 years with rate freeze: US $ 275 per year***

OTM is a trade show, children below 15 years are not allowed during Trade Hours. Rights of Admission reserved with Fairfest Media Ltd.

For More Details Please Contact : Harsh Agarwal +91 - 9830688685

Some of our Partners & Supporting Organisations at OTM 2016

FOCUS ON BUSINESS VISITORS MUMBAI, 21-23 Feb'17

OTM is the leading travel trade show in IndiaWith more than a thousand participants from 50 countries and 30 National Tourism Organisations in 2016, OTM is the biggest travel trade show in India.

OTM is held every year in Mumbai - the largest travel source market of India. Mumbai, together with its hinterland markets of the West and South India, potentially caters to 61% of all outbound travellers from India. In comparison, New Delhi, the national capital, accounts for just about 22%.

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 • 18OCEANIA

Tourism Fiji reinstates belief in #FijiNow to welcome tourists

New Zealand focuses on golf tourism to lure visitors

Hawaii records 3.8% increase in visitorsVisitor arrivals have increased by 3.8% to the island of Hawaii, reported Hawaii Tourism Authority.

Appreciating the numbers, Big Island Visitors Bureau Executive Director Ross Birch said, “For me, it was a very positive month.”

Hawaii started the year 2016 with a magnificent num-ber of 720,997 visitor arrivals accounting for a growth from January 2015 of 6.2%.

Oahu had the biggest jump in air arrivals for tourists of 8.2%, with Hawaii Island taking the second spot in the state. However, growth in per person spending per day was highest on the Big Isle, with people spending an average of $173.50 a day, a 6.6% increase over January 2015. Hawaii Island also put up the biggest increase in total visitor expenditures, with tourists leaving behind $216.3 million in January, an increase of 7.7% over last year.

Tahiti Tourism launches Discover Mana campaignBased on the prehistoric majesty of Mt Otemanu towering over the surrounding lagoon and coral reef, the beauty of Bora Bora can only be called ‘mythical’.

This year, Tahiti Tourism aims to promote a more diverse island experience which is what propelled the launch of ‘Discover Mana’ marketing campaign and video, centred around the indigenous spirit of ‘mana’ which connotes idyllic harmony of people and place.

The campaign draws attention to three aspects - the overwater bungalows and the water itself, the local people and culture, and the lush palm-carpeted forests extending deep into the islands.

“The campaign is based on a desire to tell a broader story about the destination, which for years has primarily revolved around Bora Bora and the bungalows,” said Paul Sloan, CEO and Director Gen-eral of Tahiti Tourism.

Jonathan Reap, Managing Director of Tahiti Tourism announced that the islands welcomed about 3,500 incentive participants. He informed of a growing demand for combo incentive packages pair-ing one of the resorts with the 330-passenger Paul Gauguin or 148-passenger Wind Spirit cruise ships.

“Because the hotels are all around 100 bunga-lows, a group can actually buy out an entire prop-erty and really have a customised experience all to themselves,” suggested Sloan.

Tourism Fiji is making all efforts to rebuild its econ-omy. Tourism is also the largest revenue contribu-tor to the economy and accounts for 30% of the coun-try’s GDP. “Tourism Fiji is not holding back on any of the pre-planned activities... (It) is working very closely with all our partners to ensure the message that Fiji right here right now is portrayed in every-thing that we do from our imagery, press releases, social media and marketing campaigns,” said Tourism Fiji’s Global Public Relations Manager Patricia Mallam.

Recently, Tourism Fiji also hosted many trade

agents brought in from Singapore to attend a seven-day tourism product familiarisation trip. They trav-elled to parts of Fiji to improve their understanding of what Fiji had to offer.

Around 70 agents from New Zealand and 102 from Australia were hosted between February and March. By having these agents, Tourism Fiji is supporting the Tourism Action Group (TAG) who liaise directly with consumers, to share the message that #FijiNow is absolutely fine for travellers. TAG is a committee set up by the industry and comprises hoteliers, tour operators, Tourism Fiji and Fiji Airways.

Boasting of two of the world’s greatest golf courses, New Zealand may soon count a third, thanks to Cali-fornian financier Ric Kayne.

At a distance of about 105 km north of Auckland, Kayne’s Tara Iti Golf Club offers jaw-dropping Pacific Ocean views from every hole. Opened in October last year, it is the latest in a string of American-designed courses helping to drive golf tourism in New Zealand. Investors, including Kayne and billionaire Julian Robertson, see New Zealand’s dramatic coastline and alpine valleys as potential magnets for overseas golfers.

Golfers are an attractive clientele for New Zealand’s NZ$13.5 billion tourism industry, which has overtaken dairy as the country’s biggest export earner. They spend an average of NZ$3,300 a visit, compared with the NZ$2,500 average for all visitors. Spending by the sporting vacationers is increasing 10% a year, reaching NZ$170 million ($114 million) in the 12 months through September, according to the government. It lured more tourists with the New Zealand Golf Open, near Queen-stown, that was televised in at least 60 countries.

“New Zealand is a first-class golf destination. It has tremendous physical beauty, is safe and accessi-ble. Tara Iti, we are told by visitors, is the jewel in the crown,” said Kayne, Co-Founder of Los Angeles-based Kayne Anderson Capital Advisors LP.

The total number of Indians visiting Australia increased by 18.6% in 2015, making India the eighth largest inbound market for the continent nation. The number rose to 2,33,100 last year as compared to 1,97,000 Indian tourists who visited Australia in 2014, according to data released by Tourism Australia.

Australia is currently eyeing over 2,50,000 visi-tors from India in 2016. Last year, about 68% of Indi-ans travelled to Australia for leisure (1,58,500), while 26,400 went for business, 14,800 short-term education and 33,500 for other purposes.

Of the leisure travellers, 60,500 visitors were on hol-iday in December while 98,000 visited friends and rel-atives. Indian visitors contributed over A$1.1 billion to the continent nation’s economy in 2015, up 38% over the previous year. In terms of expenditure, India is the 10th largest source market for Australia.

Last year Indian visitors spent a total of 14 million nights in Australia, an increase of 38% over 2014. The data also revealed that the average length of stay for all visitors from India was 65 nights, with a 46% doing a repeat visitation. Indian leisure visitors stayed an aver-age of 56 nights.

According to the International Visitors Survey, Indian visitor arrivals to Victoria registered a growth of 24.1% in 2015, which is significantly higher than the national average of +18.6%. Victoria was rated the second

highest state visited by Indian tourists, representing the increasing interest towards the state and changing demands of the Indian travellers when seeking an ideal holiday destination. The Indian visitor expenditure also increased in proportion by 29.8% over the same period.

Celia Ho, Regional Manager, South & South East Asia, Tourism Victoria, stated, “India has always been a key market for the State of Victoria and the surge in Indian visitors to Melbourne year-on-year is truly encouraging. Indian travellers are becoming more dis-cerning and see the value in spending on quality travel experiences as the expenditure figures have reached an all-time high - this encourages us to continue to focus on this region.”

Australia records a rise in Indian tourist numbers in 2015

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 • 19AFRICA

Kenya announces fee waiver to promote family tours

Kigali Convention Centre to open in June with hosting of African Union SummitThe Kigali Convention Centre will open in June this year, just in time to host the 27th African Union Summit.

The Executive Chairperson of Ultimate Concepts Limited (UCL) which owns this project, Eng. Didier Sugashya said the Centre is poised to be a service hub in the East African Community.

Valued at more than $300 million, the Centre will comprise of a 5-star hotel, with 292 rooms, a conference hall that can host 2,500 people, several other meeting rooms to cater to MICE groups of different sizes and also an office park.

Clarence Fernandes, Representative, Rwanda Devel-opment Board, remarked, “We are delighted to share with our industry partners here in India details of the state-of-the-art Radisson Blue Hotel and Convention Centre, Kigali.”

“This new icon, in Rwanda’s safe, secure and spot-lessly clean capital city of Kigali is only five km from the

city centre and the International Airport. Apart from the Convention Centre, there will be an outdoor swim-ming pool, a variety of restaurants, free high-speed wireless internet, cosy cafes and bars and many more facilities,” Fernandes added.

Ethiopian Airlines launches twice daily services to New Delhi from Addis Ababa

Botswana to feature as the Partner Country of ITB Berlin 2017

Ethiopian Airlines has started twice-daily flights to Delhi from Addis Ababa with the latest B737-800 New Generation Sky Interior aircraft.

Tewolde GebreMariam, Group CEO Ethiopian Air-lines, said, “India being one of the strongest economic muscles zooming into the global economic picture, availing more frequencies would catalyse the chan-nelling of investors from both countries and facili-tating business. Moreover, the addition of the flight would have a paramount significance in strengthen-ing the growing economic, political, and social rela-tionship between the two countries in particular and the two continents in general. Our customers will be able to make an immediate connection to cities like Hargeisa, Khartoum, Nairobi and some Southern Afri-can flights.”

Tadesse Tilahun, Regional Director India Sub Conti-nent, remarked, “We are really excited about the expan-sion plans of Ethiopian Airlines all over the world and in particular about the double daily operations not only from Mumbai but another Indian city - Delhi added to

the list. We are striving to give our esteemed clients more convenient connections out of India.”

The airline is expanding to new destinations, and in the past year has introduced service to Tokyo, Manila, Dublin, Los Angeles, Cape Town, Durban, Gaborone, Yaoundé, and Goma.

Botswana will be the official Partner Country of ITB Berlin 2017. This was announced at a press event at ITB Berlin 2016 where an agreement between the two was signed by Tourism Minister Tshekedi Khama II and Dr Christian Göke, CEO of Messe Ber-lin GmbH.

This will be the first Partner Country ever from southern Africa. Tourism Minister Tshekedi Khama of Botswana remarked, “The Botswana Tourism Organisation has taken the opportunity to become the Partner Country of ITB Berlin 2017 in order to share Botswana’s nature conservation achievements with the rest of the world and to raise general aware-ness of this country. Botswana’s role as the Partner

Country of the world’s largest travel trade show will ensure the long-term attention of the global tour-ism industry. It will not only place the spotlight on Botswana’s tourism successes but will also focus attention worldwide on our potential for economic development. In the past Botswana has achieved great success that has remained largely unnoticed around the world.”

Often referred to as one of the last remaining gems of Africa, Botswana was quick to realise its potential as a tourism destination. Next to the dia-mond industry, the most important branch of the economy, the tourism sector currently already accounts for five percent of GDP.

The Kenya government has waived visa fee for children below 16 years of age. Park fee will also be capped at $60 down from $90 for the financial year 2016-17. The Head of State, Uhuru Kenyatta has directed the National Trea-sury to follow up on the directive and make necessary amends on respective laws for its full implementation.

The Kenya President said that the visa fee waiver is aimed at positioning Kenya as a family holiday desti-nation thereby encouraging more family visitors into the country. The incentive package for charter opera-tions, worth $30 per seat, has been extended to June 30, 2018, an additional year beyond the initial time frame of next year.

The Shs 1.2 billion incentive is offering a pas-senger subsidy of $30 per seat filled with interna-tional passengers who terminate or disembark in

Kenya. Charter airlines will need to ensure that 80% of their passengers terminate in Malindi or Mom-basa as well as commit to operating the Kenyan route for at least two consecutive years to qualify for the

programme. Landing fee for all charter airlines ter-minating their journeys at the Kenyan coast has also been waived in the programme that will run till June 30, 2018.

RwandAir, the national carrier of Rwanda, is all set to start their India operations, commencing Septem-ber 2016. This move will enhance trade, tourism and investments between India and Rwanda.

The airline will commence four weekly flights, directly connecting Mumbai with Kigali. The air-craft to be deployed on this key sector will be an Airbus-330, with a seating capacity of up to 274, effectively spread over three classes – First Class, Business Class and Economy Class.

Clarence Fernandes, Representative, Rwanda Development Board remarked, “We have been eagerly awaiting the commencement of direct flights between Mumbai and Kigali and are delighted that this will be a reality in this September 2016. Rwan-dAir will make a stopover in Dar-es-Salaam in Tan-zania and we do believe that this will be great for Rwanda, India and even Tanzania.”

“Air connectivity is always a key factor in pro-moting any destination. With RwandaAir provid-ing this vital link, we can well look forward to a very satisfying year ahead in terms of Indian visitor arriv-als into this beautiful land of a thousand hills and a million smiles. This connectivity will also facilitate trade and investments between India and Rwanda,” Fernandes added.

Rwanda Tourism and RwandAir were both pres-ent at the OTM 2016 which took place at Bombay Exhibition Centre recently.

Private sector players, both tour operators and hotel companies were present to make an impact and discuss business with their Indian counterparts. Remarkable Rwanda looks forward to welcoming an increased number of Indian visitors and business-men this year.

RwandAir to start India operations

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 • 21CARIBBEAN

Antigua and Barbuda tourism is hoping for a very strong year in 2016 after the country reported a 14% increase in air arrivals in January, according to the tourist board’s latest numbers. That represented a total of 26,928 stayover visitors.

“The strong performance we experienced in November and December as we closed off 2015 is continuing into 2016,” said Tourism Minister Asot Michael. “Growth was recorded in our two largest, major source markets and it is clear that our stra-tegic tourism plan is returning positive results in a big way.”

UK accounted for 8,536 visitors, a 20% increase

over January 2015, the strongest month for the UK market in Antigua since March 2014.

“We have increased airlift to the destination, made enhancements to the product, strategically looked at our hotel operations and room stock, and intensified our sales and marketing efforts. The growth now, speaks volumes of the extremely hard work put in by our teams and industry partners,” Michael said.

Air arrivals from U.S. grew by 12%, as airlift to the destination surged with the addition of Jet Blue service.

The destination also reported a 68% hotel occu-pancy rate last month, up from 62.1% in January.

Antigua and Barbuda Tourism’s promising start to 2016

Belize witness a big tourism rebound

Curaçao Tourism rises by 3.1% in 2015

Following a sluggish peak tourist season, things were looking grim for tourism growth in Belize, but a strong summer season put the Caribbean des-tination into a strong position by the end of the year.

As per the latest data from the Caribbean Tourism Organisation, Belize reported a 6.2% increase in tour-ist arrivals in 2015.

While the country reported a 1.2% decline in the peak tourist season, it reported a significant 11.3% improve-ment in the summer season.

The country saw a particularly strong increase in arrivals from the United States, with an eight percent increase compared to 2014, which somehow softened the blow of a reduction in tourism from Canada.

Tourism booming in the Turks and Caicos IslandsTourism in Turks and Caicos saw another strong year in 2015. This is according to newly-released data from the territory’s tourist board.

The archipelago reported a total of 386,052 stopover visitors last year, which was an increase of 8.1% com-pared to 2014.

The TCI was boosted by a strong month of December, with 39,627

arrivals and a 17.8% year-over-year increase.

United States continued to be the largest tourism source market for Turks and Caicos, with 315,247 total visitors and an 8.8% improvement over the previous year.

Turks and Caicos however saw a 3.9% decline from the Canadian mar-ket, with a total of 36,512 arrivals.

According to the latest data from the Caribbean Tour-ism Organisation, Curaçao tourism showed improve-ment in 2015. The Dutch Caribbean island reported a 3.1% increase in tourist arrivals, with a total of 468,442 stayover tourists.

The island witnessed a very strong winter in which it reported a 9.2% year-over-year increase in arrivals.

The island showed particular improvement with Canadians, with a 45.5% increase to 18,229 tourists in 2015, while U.S. improved by 15.3% to 61,593. The lat-ter was boosted in part due to new flights to the des-tination by JetBlue.

Additionally the Curaçao Tourist Board (CTB)

recently launched a new online tool known as the ‘Tourism Insight’ active report to provide key data and statistics on Curaçao tourism. The tool is aimed at assisting stakeholders and the general public in

making informed socio-economic decisions. The data is gathered from the Embarkation and Disem-barkation cards. The content would be updated on a monthly basis.

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 • 22global

UNWTO’s Visa Openness levels to trigger growth

Asian airports report strong passenger growth driven by China and India in 2015According to the data report from Airports Coun-cil International (ACI), in the Asia Pacific region, passenger traffic growth at airports was consid-erably faster than the global average of +6.1% seen in 2015, with China (8.0%) and India (16.4%) driv-ing the region. Half of the passenger traffic growth seen in Asia Pacific last year came from these two countries.

Other major contributors to the region’s strong growth were Thailand (21.2%), South Korea (10.7%), Hong Kong (8.3%) and Japan (4.0%).

In China, passenger traffic growth was led by Shanghai Pudong Airport (16.3%), while the region’s busiest passenger hub, Beijing Capital, increased 4.4% to almost 90 million passengers. Shenzhen Airport saw year-on-year growth of 9.5%.

India’s aviation boom led to several of the coun-try’s airports posting double-digit traffic growth in 2015. Significant growth was seen at Bengaluru (25.2%), Hyderabad (22.0%), Mumbai (16.1%) and Delhi (15.7%) airports.

Among all airports in the region, Bangkok Don

Mueang (40.6%) saw the strongest growth rate, while other notable performances were seen at Osaka’s Kansai (19.9%) and Busan (19.6%) airports.

Strong growth at Abu Dhabi (17.3%) and Dubai (10.7%) airports helped the Middle East record the world’s highest traffic growth in 2015, at 11.3%.

The World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) has been long advocating for advance travel facilitation as a means to promote tourism development and multiply its socio-economic benefits. According to UNWTO’s latest Visa Openness Report, the share of tourists who require obtaining a visa prior to travel-ling continues to decline and is at its lowest level ever. In 2015, 39% of the world population could travel for tourism without obtaining a traditional visa prior to departure as compared to only 23% in 2008. On aver-age, 18% of the world’s population was able to travel to a destination without a visa in 2015, while another 15% could receive a visa on arrival and six percent was able to obtain eVisas.

“Prioritising travel facilitation is central to stim-ulating economic growth and job creation through tourism. We are pleased to see that a growing number of governments around the world think likewise...at a moment when safety and security are top of the agenda for all of us, we need to work closer together to promote a safe, secure and seamless travel envi-ronment by using the possibilities offered by tech-nology and international cooperation in data shar-ing,” said UNWTO Secretary-General, Taleb Rifai.

UNWTO recommends destinations to focus par-ticularly on a stronger segmentation of travellers, in improving visa application processes and entry pro-cedures, in making use of regional integration oppor-tunities, and on providing precise and accessible information for tourists.

Research by UNWTO and the World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC) on the impact of visa facilitation on the G20 economies, as well as on the economies of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) clearly shows that visa facilitation can boost demand, grow exports and create addi-tional jobs.

International tourist arrivals grew by 4.4% in 2015 to reach a total of 1184 million in 2015, according to the latest UNWTO World Tourism Barometer. Some 50 million more tourists (overnight visitors) travelled to international destinations around the world last year as compared to 2014.

2015 marks the sixth consecutive year of above-aver-age growth, with international arrivals increasing by four percent or more.

“International tourism reached new heights in 2015. The robust performance of the sector is contributing to economic growth and job creation in many parts of the world. It is thus critical for countries to promote policies that foster the continued growth of tourism, including travel facilitation, human resources development and sustainability,” said UNWTO Secretary-General, Taleb Rifai.

Results from the UNWTO Confidence Index remain largely positive for 2016, though at a slightly lower level as compared to the previous two years. Based on the current trend and outlook, UNWTO projects interna-tional tourist arrivals to grow by four percent world-wide in 2016.

By region, growth is expected to be stronger in Asia and the Pacific and the Americas, followed by Europe. The projections for Africa and the Middle East are pos-itive, though with a larger degree of uncertainty and volatility.

UNWTO reports 4% growth in international tourist arrivals worldwide in 2015

According to a global ranking released, Denmark, closely followed by Switzerland, is the happiest coun-try in the world.

The 2016 World Happiness Report seeks to quantify happiness as a means of making societies healthier and more efficient. The United Nations published the first such study in 2012.

Like last year, Iceland, Norway, Finland, Canada, Netherlands, New Zealand, Australia and Sweden round out the top 10, making small or medium-sized countries in Western Europe seven of the top 10 hap-piest countries.

The United States, where sharp polarisation has been exposed in the 2016 presidential election cam-paign, out-ranked several Western European countries to be 13th most happy nation, up two spots from last year.

Germany was 16th, Britain 23rd and France 32nd. A string of Middle Eastern kingdoms – Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait and Bahrain – out-ranked Italy, which came in at number 50, and Japan, which took the 53rd spot. China, the world’s most populous country, was ranked 83rd and India, the world’s largest democracy, came in at 118.

The authors of the report said six factors - GDP per capita, social support, healthy life expectancy, social freedom, generosity and absence of corruption – explain almost three-quarters of the variation across different countries.

The report compared levels of happiness in 2005-2007, before the onset of the global recession, with 2013-2015, the most recent three-year period for which data from a Gallup World Poll is available.

Denmark tops global happiness index

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 23 global •

MasterCard and AccorHotels partnership offers exclusive privileges at more than 550 hotels in Asia Pacific

Marriott International has consolidated its takeover deal of Starwood Hotels by revising it. The amended agreement and the ILG transaction have a combined current value of $85.36 per share of Starwood common stock, which is more than what the Consortium offered ($83.83 per share).

Under the merger agreement, Starwood sharehold-ers will receive $21 in cash and 0.80 shares of Marriott International, Inc. Class A common stock for each share of Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Inc. common stock. Excluding its time share business, the transaction values Starwood at approximately $13.6 billion ($79.53 per share), consisting of $10 billion of Marriott International stock, based on the closing price of $73.16, and $3.6 billion of cash, based on approximately 170 million outstand-ing Starwood shares. Starwood shareholders will own approximately 34% of the combined company’s common stock after completion of the merger, based on current

shares outstanding.In addition, Starwood stockholders are expected to

receive separate consideration in the form of Interval Lei-sure Group (ILG) common stock from the spin-off of the Starwood time share business and subsequent merger with ILG, currently valued at $5.83 per Starwood share,

based on ILG’s share price as of market close on March 18, 2016 (the ‘ILG transaction’). Both companies continue to expect that the closing of this transaction will occur well before the planned date of the Marriott-Starwood merger closing.

Marriott is confident it can achieve $250 million in annual cost synergies within two years after closing, up from $200 million estimated in November 2015, when announcing the original merger agreement. This revised agreement offers superior value for Starwood’s sharehold-ers, the ability to close quickly, and provides value creation potential that will allow both sets of shareholders to ben-efit from improved financial performance.

Marriott and Starwood have already obtained impor-tant regulatory consents necessary to complete the trans-action, including clearing pre-merger antitrust reviews in the United States and Canada.

MasterCard and AccorHotels announced a partnership that offered MasterCard cardholders exclusive privi-leges when they stay at selected AccorHotels proper-ties in Asia Pacific. From delicious meals and award-winning spa retreats to a complimentary night’s stay, MasterCard cardholders can look forward to an excit-ing range of indulgent treats and deals when they stay at more than 550 AccorHotels properties in the region.

As part of the three-year partnership, AccorHotels and MasterCard had introduced three programmes to make cardholders’ holidays a little more special. Card-holders looking for a much-needed escape can book a three-day, two night stay at any of AccorHotels’ partic-ipating resorts and enjoy a complimentary night with AccorHotels’ Dream Getaway programme which was valid until March 2016.

Those longing for some fun in the sun can enter AccorHotels’ My Resort Moment competition – by snapping and sharing a special moment at an AccorHo-tels hotel or resort on Instagram, one lucky cardholder stands to win one of four luxury resort stays worth up to $1000 which was valid until March 2016.

To unlock these exclusive deals, all cardholders needed to do was visit the MasterCard-AccorHotels partner page, enter their Le Club AccorHotels loyalty number, and the last four digits of their MasterCard card.

“We are very excited to partner with MasterCard to offer their cardholders special privileges and offers when they stay with AccorHotels and hope that this partnership will encourage their members to explore more of our hotels and resorts across Asia Pacific,” said

Michael Parsons, AccorHotels Vice President Market-ing & Strategic Relationships, Asia Pacific. “AccorHotels has more than 550 participating hotels across 17 coun-tries and we continue to open one new hotel per week on average across the region, so there are choices for every type of stay, from city centres to beachside resorts and everything in between.”

“Asia Pacific has long been home to some of the world’s top tourist attractions, and MasterCard’s Global Destination Cities Index 2015 showed that six of the most visited cities in the world are now right here in Asia,” said Nagesh Devata, Group Head of Merchant & Acceptance Development, Asia Pacific, MasterCard. “Through our partnership with AccorHotels, we want to provide MasterCard cardholders travelling to coun-tries in the region with not just great value but also access to an array of exclusive rewards and privileges that will make their trips even more priceless. AccorHo-tels’ impressive and expanding footprint across this region also means travellers will be able to enjoy these privileges wherever they travel to.”

Marriott International revises Starwood merger agreement

[email protected]

India’s Only Global Travel Trade Newspaper

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 24 • global

Hilton to offer hostel-like accommodationHilton Worldwide Holdings may launch a new brand to focus on small, cheap hotels in big cities. “There’s potential for something that has more of an urban flair, more of a micro-hotel. We haven’t made a deci-sion to do anything in that space, but it’s certainly one of the things we’ve been exploring,” said Chris Nas-setta, CEO, Hilton Worldwide Holdings.

Many hoteliers face increasing competition for budget accommodation from online providers such as Airbnb Inc. Hilton aims to bring in large num-ber of young travellers seeking no-frills, affordable lodging.

The new brand aims to offer ‘hostel-like’ accom-modation to younger guests with lower prices and less service, Nassetta said. According to him, Hil-ton prefers to develop new brands itself, rather than making acquisitions.

Spending by young overseas tourists around the world is forecast to rise to $336 billion by 2020 from $230 billion in 2014, according to Stay Wyse.

Half of millennials spend at least 1,000 euros ($1,100) during a trip, according to a November 2014 report by the company that represents the global youth-travel industry.

Major hospitality players feature in 2016 Fortune 100 Best Companies to Work ForMajor hospitality players have been named in the 2016 Fortune 100 Best Companies to Work For, by global research and consulting firm Great Place to Work and Fortune Magazine. This list recog-nises companies that have exceptional workplace cultures.

A subsidiary of Hyatt Hotels Corporation, Hyatt Corporation, has earned a spot on the prestigious list for three consecutive years, and ranked at 47, its position on the list jumped 31 places over 2015.

“At Hyatt, it’s our best-in-the-business people who drive our success in delivering distinct brand experiences that drive irrational loyalty,” said Pete Sears, Group President – Americas for Hyatt. “Mem-bers of the Hyatt family consistently use empathy to build deep relationships not only with our guests and but also with each other, and our distinct cul-ture reflects an environment where people can be their true selves.”

Newcomer Hilton Worldwide secured the rank 56. The company is said to listen closely to its team members to help create the benefits and programmes

that matter most to them. “Our Team Members are the heart and soul of our

business,” said Christopher J Nassetta, President & CEO of Hilton Worldwide. “We succeed when they succeed. Respecting, recognising and rewarding them create an environment where – together – we have created the world’s best hospitality company.”

Four Seasons Hotels & Resorts ranked 70, while

tech giant Google has been ranked No. 1 for the sev-enth time.

The selection process includes an employee sur-vey and an in-depth questionnaire about company practices and programmes. Great Place to Work then evaluates each application using its unique methodology based on five dimensions: credibility, respect, fairness, pride and camaraderie.

Creators of the methodology behind the list, Great Place to Work, have found that employees believe they work for great organisations when they consis-tently trust the people they work for, have pride in what they do and enjoy the people they work with.

“Now more than ever, it is important for com-panies to prove they are great workplaces,” said Michael Bush, CEO of Great Place to Work. “Top talent expects as much as they seek new opportu-nities, and customers are demanding it as well as they decide where to spend their dollars. The 100 best workplaces are at the top of the heap in dem-onstrating they have a hightrust, high-performing culture.”

India’s Only Global Travel Trade Publication

NOW ONLINE

www.travelnewsdigest.inFor regular newsletters, email: [email protected]

follow us

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 • 25technology

OYO Rooms investor, Soft Bank has confirmed the much speculated acquisition of ZO Rooms by the budget hotel aggregator.

SoftBank has listed the transaction in its most recent financial report. However, the Japanese investment company hasn’t disclosed the value of the acquisition.

This acquisition will clearly put OYO Rooms on the top in this space with a significant margin. The acquisition comes after Zostel Hospitality, the pro-

moters of ZO Rooms, failed to raise additional funds for further growth from their existing investors or bring in new investors. Zo Rooms raised roughly $35 million from Tiger Global and Orios Management in 2005.

All of ZO Rooms listed properties have been transferred to OYO, with many ZO employees also having joined OYO already. While the details of the acquisitions are still awaited from the companies in question, there are reports that the acquisition for-malities will be completed soon.

Goibibo number one in hotel booking volumes in India, reports Morgan Stanley Goibibo hotel bookings crossed 1.6 million room nights for the period October to December 2015 (Q3), growing by 400% YOY. Mobile contributed to 71% of the bookings in the month of December 2015 up from 42% a year ago.

As per a recent research report by Morgan Stanley (report released in December 2015), Goibibo.com is the number one in hotel booking volumes in India. Goib-ibo is also the most preferred OTA by hoteliers across parameters in India.

Goibibo has been rated number one by hoteliers across parameters comprising: Higher booking vol-umes; Confirmed Bookings; Last Minute Bookings; Backend and IT support; Insights and market intelli-gence. As per the same research report besides being number one, Goibibo is also the fastest growing hotels OTA in India. Goibibo’s hotels facing technologies is also the most used amongst hoteliers.

Ashish Kashyap, Founder of ibibo (Owner of Goib-ibo, redBus, Ryde etc) said, “We are excited that we have achieved the No. 1 position in India in the hotels category. We have been able to achieve the same by strengthening network effects, providing a superior user experience on mobile and delivering powerful tools and technologies to thousands of hotels.”

45% of hotel bookings come from 0-2 star rated hotels, followed by 38% from 3-star category and 17% is garnered from 4-5 star rated hotels. Business destina-tions contribute close to 45% of hotel bookings whereas leisure destinations constitute to about 55% of hotel booking volumes.

As per the same research report, Goibibo is also con-tributing the largest growth to hotels across geographies.

SpiceJet has rolled out an end-to-end travel solu-tions platform, SpiceVacations.com, which offers customised travel packages, where customers can avail various services while planning their hol-iday, at no added cost to make it a ‘Red.Hot.Spicy’ experience.

SpiceVacations.com offers a comprehensive platform for customers to choose from thousands of travel packages, spread over a vast network of domestic and international destinations.

Customers need to simply decide on the theme of their vacation, say – pilgrimage, honeymoon or a wildlife tour and the platform displays a wide vari-ety of deals in terms of the location, hotel arrange-ments, local sight-seeing tours, car rentals among

others. Customers can also hand-pick the service fea-tures to customise their deal packs to best suit their needs and preferences. SpiceVacations.com will also enable customers to hold a booking up to 48 hours upon payment of a refundable deposit.

The launch of pilgrimage deal packs has been a pioneering initiative by SpiceVacations.com as the avenue has been explored for the first time in the air travel industry.

The platform which offers highly tailored deals for both business and leisure travellers is well equipped with unique customisation features and enables cus-tomers to tweak their itinerary even while on the go, may it be adding a day or upgrading a hired car.

“We want to ensure our customers have a ‘Red.Hot.Spicy’ experience every single time they ven-ture out for a trip then may it be a long leisure escape or a brief business tour. SpiceVacations.com has been designed as a one-stop shop offer-ing enviable travel deals for you to pick and choose from amongst the best the industry can offer and its unique customisation features adds that extra finesse to your planning exercise, enabling you to experience the perfect holiday every single time,” said Ajay Singh, Chairman and Managing Director, SpiceJet.

SpiceJet launches end-to-end travel solutions platform SpiceVacations.com

SoftBank confirms acquisition of ZO Rooms by OYO Rooms

Bollywood stars Ranveer Singh and Alia Bhatt have been signed up as the new brand ambassadors for MakeMyTrip. The move aims at strengthening the brand’s appeal, stature and recall amongst its audi-ence in first tier towns and cities across the country.

Saujanya Shrivastava, Chief Marketing Officer, MakeMyTrip said, “Makemytrip aims to inspire and enable the restless wanderlust in every per-son’s heart. And as the brand injects new energy into its ambitions, there is a raring-to-go spirit that it has started to spread. On that journey, tak-ing on two key protagonists to represent this spirit of wanderlust is a key step. Like the brand, both Ranveer Singh and Alia Bhatt represent the new age of Indians - confident, bold, and unafraid to try new things. In their cinematic journey too they are experimental, have fun in whatever they do and give everything its maximum due. Like true trav-ellers who push forth on their travel ambitions, their persona is incredibly aspirational. It’s a great

fit with the brand, which we hope can inspire more of India to travel.”

The duo have engaged in high-decibel cam-paign that has high visibility and impactful pres-ence across mediums and are supported by digital and on-ground marketing activations.

Ranveer Singh and Alia Bhatt become new faces of MakeMyTrip

ixigo has announced the launch of ‘ixibook’ which will allow travellers to make bookings for flights and hotels within its app without being redirected to a third-party app or website. ixigo has also collabo-rated with Cleartrip and OYO Rooms as its launch partners for flights and hotels respectively.

Aloke Bajpai, ixigo Co-founder & CEO, said, “This is a first of its kind innovation in the Indian travel market, and we have chosen to work with the indus-try’s best for our initial launch. With ixibook, we will deliver a much smoother customer experience for ixigoers and enhance conversions for our part-ners by allowing users to book with them natively within our app. We expect to move over 30% of our flight and hotel bookings to ixibook within the next few months, as well as add more partners to ixibook later this year.”

Commenting on the launch, Stuart Crighton, CEO, Cleartrip said, “We’re excited to partner with ixigo on this first-of-its-kind paradigm where an online travel agency and meta-search collaborate closely to create a better user experience, something that we both value immensely.”

Ritesh Agarwal, CEO, OYO Rooms added, “ixigo

possesses deep insights into traveller behaviour and a rich content focus. Through this collaboration, their audience will find value in our offerings and we will be able to expand our reach to engage leisure travel enthusiasts.”

Currently available on ixigo’s android app, ixi-book allows a user to book a flight or hotel in just one tap. ixibook also stores traveller information, thereby considerably reducing booking time for all subsequent transactions. Post-booking customer support is handled directly by the respective part-ner. ixibook will also be launching on iOS and web platforms in the coming weeks.

ixigo launches new app ixibook in partnership with Cleartrip and OYO Rooms to simplify travel bookings

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 26 • technology

TripAdvisor improves its destination pages with new partner programme

OYO Rooms partners with PayPal for global transactions and bookingsOnline payment solutions provider PayPal has tied up with OYO Rooms to help it source payments from global consumers and allow Indian users to make international bookings. The partnership with Pay-Pal will enable OYO Rooms customers to pay for their bookings in Malaysia and other South East Asian countries, the two companies said in a joint statement.

“Growth of new age businesses like OYO Rooms can be further accelerated if they are protected against online payment risks and frauds,” said Hamish Moline, Vice President of Regional Merchant Services, PayPal APAC.

PayPals technology protects merchants such as OYO Rooms against unauthorised transactions and mitigates associated risks, he added.

“This tie-up with PayPal will assist us in deliver-ing a seamless payment experience through reduced friction during the payment process. PayPal is a global

leader in payments and we look forward to their net-work supporting our growth,” said OYO Rooms COO, Abhinav Sinha.

Yatra.com appoints Vikrant Mudaliar as Chief Marketing OfficerYatra.com has announced the appointment of Vikrant Mudaliar as the Chief Marketing Officer of the com-pany. He will be responsible for leading marketing activities across all Yatra.com business lines and group entities. While focusing on strengthening Yatra’s brand equity in the travel category, he will be responsible for driving the marketing and communi-cations strategy to support the company’s overall stra-tegic objectives. The role will also have him responsi-ble for all traffic and consumer marketing initiatives across web and mobile platforms and driving cus-tomer engagement and loyalty.

Commenting on the appointment, Sharat Dhall, President, Yatra.com said, “We are extremely excited to have Vikrant as part of the leadership team at Yatra. He belongs to a rare breed of marketing professionals who have created and built brands in new categories. Vikrant’s experience in traditional marketing and dig-ital media coupled with his consumer understanding will be crucial in Yatra’s next phase of growth.”

“Travel as a sector has always intrigued me and to work for Yatra at this pivotal time when the indus-try is seeing customer empowerment like never before through innovative e-commerce platforms, is abso-lutely thrilling,” said Vikrant.

TripAdvisor has upgraded its destination pages and revealed a new initiative that allows tourism boards and Destination Management Organisations (DMOs) to customise their content. The new ‘Pre-mium Destination Partnership’ is available to all DMOs worldwide, enabling them to self-manage their destination content on the travel site.

There are three sections that can be controlled: ‘Collections’, which provides lists of hotels, restau-rants and attractions; ‘Articles’, which allows DMOs to create travel information for potential visitors; and ‘Events’, which offers information about upcoming events in the destination.

The DMO-supplied content will run alongside TripAdvisor’s existing user-generated content and booking tools that are already available on its desti-nation pages. DMOs participating in the programme will be offered access to a new dashboard that offers information about the performance of the content, as well as the campaign’s impact on tourism to their destination. Premium Destination Partnerships are now available in 28 languages.

The Montcalm London Marble Arch has become the first of the Montcalm Hotels to launch ‘Handy’, a smartphone service to bolster their guest offering and promise to connect the disconnected.

Guests of The Montcalm London Marble Arch will be able to use Handy devices entirely free of charge, for the entire duration of their stay in the UK capital, enabling them to make local and inter-national calls to destinations including USA, Can-ada, Saudi Arabia, Dubai and India and access 3G data to use the Internet.

In addition, Handy’s tailored service offers over 200 points-of-interest that include: travel recom-mendations updated throughout the day, interac-tive maps, websites and a one-touch reservation option which will include access to all restaurants and major attractions.

To protect the guests’ privacy, all personal infor-mation and browsing history will be completely cleared from the Handy smartphones when the guest is checked out of the hotel.

Due to a high number of overseas business and leisure travellers increasingly struggling with their handheld devices when travelling to the UK, Mont-calm have introduced the complimentary Handy

smartphone service at The Montcalm London Mar-ble Arch and soon to follow at other Montcalm hotels in the collection.

Ramesh Arora, Managing Director of Montcalm Hotels said, “In the digital era, complete mobile connectivity should be a given, so we’re delighted to be the first hotel group in the UK to offer this ser-vice with the Handy smartphone. It demonstrates our commitment to putting the customer first by offering them the very best value during their stay, because it means our international guests can stay connected to their world, with our compliments.”

Montcalm luxury hotels launch a smartphone service

Ezeego1 launches Holiday in India package to promote domestic travel In line with the ‘Make in India’ programme, Ezeego1, India’s biggest online travel bazaar, launched ‘Holiday in India’, an offering of domestic packages that celebrate India’s rich heritage and travel opportunities.

As part of the ‘Holiday in India’ week, Ezeego1 offered packages that bring out the true essence of India. To avail special discounts, travellers could book tickets till February 18 for travel period between April and June for packages starting at ̀ 23,835.

Neelu Singh, Director and CEO, Ezeego1.com said, “Despite India’s diverse tourism offering, most

destinations in India have remained untapped. We now see a changing trend where Indian travellers are looking at exploring far off destinations like Ladakh, Andaman and Sikkim that compliment their interest for interna-tional destinations.”

“The wave of activism and fervor for all things Indian that is sweeping the country, reflects in tourism as well. With the launch of this campaign, Ezeego1 is giving trav-ellers a fresh perspective and encouraging them to take roads less travelled, and in turn be a shot in the arm for domestic tourism,” she added.

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 • 27rEsPOnsIBLE TOurIsM

Ljubljana becomes the Green Capital of Europe

ESOI and MoT to work together to promote sustainable tourism

Minister of Railways launches Clean My Coach serviceThe Minister of Railways Suresh Prabhakar Prabhu launched ‘Clean My Coach’ service with New Delhi/Northern Railway, Mumbai Central/Western Railway and Lucknow Junction/North Eastern Railway. Manoj Kumar Sinha, Minister of State for Railways was especially present on the occasion. On behalf of the Indian Railways, Chairman, Railway Board, A K Mital, Member Mechanical Hemant Kumar and other board members were present on the occasion. Sev-eral public representatives and senior officials from the sides of New Delhi/Northern Railway, Mumbai Central/Western Railway and Luc-know Junction/North Eastern Railway stations participated in the occasion.

As per the scheme, for any cleaning require-ment in the coach, the passenger sends an SMS on a mobile number 58888. Alternatively, the passenger can also use android app ‘Cleanmy-coach Indian Railways’ or webpage ‘cleanmy-coach.com’ for logging the request. Apart from this, dustbins have been put in the non-AC coaches. At the launch, Prabhu harped on how it is the equal responsibility of the railway admin-istration and citizens of the country to maintain cleanliness in and around railway premises. He further said that Indian Railways is on the fast track in the field of digitisation, cleanliness, pas-senger amenities, coach designs, mechanised laundries, on board services, social media, etc. He assured more passenger friendly services in the near future for better travelling experience in trains.

Speaking on the occasion, Manoj Sinha said that the Indian Railways has adopted Prime Minister’s ‘Swachh Bharat Campaign’ in a big way. He said that launching of ‘Clean My Coach’ Service itself fixes responsibility of on board staff to ascertain cleanliness in trains. He said that Indian Railways who works as team will leave no stone unturned to bring the railways at world standard.

IATA signs declaration to protect the wildlifeOn behalf of the aviation industry, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) signed a declara-tion aimed at reducing the illegal trafficking of wildlife and underlining the aviation industry’s commitment to sustainability.

The interconnected air transport network is being exploited by criminal gangs to smuggle animals or their products from the killing field to the market place. The air transport industry can help stop this trade by pro-viding additional intelligence to enforcement authori-ties about suspicious shipments.

“I can think of few other causes that galvanise more interest and support across the global transport and logistics sectors than the challenge of wildlife traffick-ing,” said Tony Tyler, IATA’s Director General and CEO.

The ‘United for Wildlife’ initiative, created by the Royal Foundation of The Duke and Duchess of Cam-bridge and Prince Harry, invited representatives of the transport industry to Buckingham Palace to pledge their support. IATA, Airports Council International, the African Airlines Association and a number of indi-vidual airlines signed commitments aimed at raising awareness of the trafficking issue among passengers,

and training staff to recognise and report suspicious packages and behaviour. The initial focus of action will be on the trafficking of high-risk protected animals, specifically certain big cats, pangolins, and ivory prod-ucts, on high-risk routes, particularly originating from or transiting through East Africa.

“Today marks a step forward for environmental pro-tection – a commitment that we take very seriously. In the 1990’s the industry came together to address noise. More recently we joined forces to manage our impact on climate change – committing as an industry to carbon-neutral growth from 2020 and to cut net emissions to half the 2005 levels by 2050. We now extend that com-mitment to playing an active role in reducing illegal traf-ficking of wildlife. We will collaborate in support of gov-ernment enforcement authorities to put an end to this evil trade,” added Tyler.

EU has formally awarded Ljubljana the title of Europe’s Green Capital 2016 in acknowledge-ment of its sustainable development for the past ten years. The Slovenian capital celebrated the honour with events throughout the day.

“Once white, today green,” Prime Minister Miro Cerar said as he addressed a high-pro-file ceremony, commending the city’s efforts in managing to achieve the title. “Today when many cities are ever more polluted, Ljubljana is even cleaner and greener, so we are proudly referring to it as Europe’s green capital,” he added.

European Commissioner Violeta Bulc high-lighted that for years Ljubljana has been assum-ing the leading role in numerous innovative projects, also in the field of mobility, and that ensuring sustainable development is important for a green city to be a smart city, as well, open to innovation. She stressed the Green Capital title was not the goal but a milestone on the way towards creating conditions for quality living.

The Mayor Zoran Janković pointed out that for him the day was that of gratitude and pride. He further accentuated the need for solidar-ity towards fellow people and future genera-tions in order to leave behind nature preserved in the same state. He also reiterated one of his favourite lines, “For me, Ljubljana is the most beautiful city in the world.”

The ceremony, at which some 2000 guests were invited, was broadcast by the public TV station and featured the presentation of various green projects carried out by Ljubljana.

The Union Ministry of Tourism (MoT) and Ecotourism Society of India (ESOI) have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in Delhi to work towards driving and advocating Sustainable Tourism Criteria for India (STCI) initiatives in the country. The MoU was signed by Suman Billa, Joint Secretary – Tourism, Government of India and Steve Borgia, President, ESOI in the pres-ence of Vinod Zutshi, Secretary – Tourism, Government of India.

As per the MoU, ESOI will prepare a 10-year road map for advocacy and certification under the Sustain-able Tourism Criteria for India. The road map will be based on regional workshops held with relevant stake-holders across the country. ESOI, through stakeholder consultations, will formulate criteria and classification guidelines for certification for the accommodation and tour/travel operators within the STCI guidelines and later develop standards for destinations which will also be in sync with the internationally accepted Global Sus-tainable Tourism Criteria.

Through this MoU, it is expected that sustain-able tourism and responsible tourism will take the forefront and achieve the commitments of the

Ministry’s action plan.ESOI was established at the behest of the MoT as

a non-profit organisation to promote environmen-tally responsible and sustainable practices in the tourism industry across the country. This national body was formed by a group of eminent profession-als from the tourism industry, environmentalists and conservationists.

In the month of April, more than one billion people in 192 countries would take action to protect our envi-ronment. All around the globe, from big cities to small villages, people are organising, demanding climate action, cleaning up their local communities, meeting with their elected officials, planting trees, and teach-ing their children to protect our planet.

In a rare and special event, United Nations Sec-retary General Ban Ki-moon has asked every world leader to the United Nations to officially sign the Paris Climate Agreement reached last December, which is being opened for signatures on April 22, Earth Day.

“Earth Day is the largest, most recognisable face of the environmental movement,” said Kathleen Rogers, President of Earth Day Network. “Millions of people in dozens of different countries will become lifelong environmentalists this Earth Day. Hundreds of thou-sands will be children – our planet’s future. They will join the more than one billion people who already use Earth Day to focus on the urgent need to stabilise and reduce global greenhouse gas emissions and fight cli-mate change.”

For this year, Earth Day Network is focusing on planting new trees and forests worldwide. As Earth Day’s 50th anniversary is approaching in 2020, EDN is vowing to plant 7.8 billion trees worldwide – one for every person on Earth. This down-payment is neces-sary in order to combat climate change and keep our

most vulnerable eco-systems from facing extinction.As in previous years, Earth Day to set to be com-

memorated widely in India, said Karuna Singh, Country Director for India.

“We have no higher priority this year than to make sure the United States, China, India, the EU, and all the largest CO2 emitters sign the Paris Agreement to prove that what happened in Paris was not all talk. Signing the Paris Agreement this Earth Day at the United Nations is just the beginning,” Rogers said. “That, coupled with our global activities, will make this the largest, most significant Earth Day in years and a perfect start in our countdown to Earth Day 2020, our 50th!”

More than one billion people in 192 countries to engage in Earth Day

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 28 • Responsible TouRism

Importance of incorporating Responsible Travel in Education SectorGuest Column

A Lajwanti Naidu & Gaurav Bhan Bhatnagar

Emphasis by ancient Vedic scriptures on travelling and its importance in modern education

Our ancient scriptures from Vedic times have emphasised that practical and holistic learning can be imparted by travelling. The term ‘atana’ in San-skrit literature means going out. Out of this derived the three most important words Deshatana, Thirta-naa, and Paryyatana.• Deshantana means going out of the country for knowledge and economic gains• Thirthana means visiting religious and spiritual places for Spiritual gains• Parytanaa means visiting various destinations for knowledge and pleasure

To supplement the above deliberations, in Ramayana Rama and Lakshmana were sent to study with sage Vishwamitra and Vasishta. The Kauravas and Pandavas learnt from the great warrior teacher Dronacharya. In spite of the luxuries these princes lived, they were moved out of the comfort zone into a Gurukul to adopt themselves to guru shishyaparam-para style of living.

In today’s modern world where devices are used for Development and Technology for teaching, a stu-dent is unable to comprehend the essentials in edu-cation. Therefore it is important for us to incorpo-rate travel experiences in education sector. And not just another travel experience, but a responsible travel experience.It is imperative that every student learns the A-B-C-D-E of Responsible Travel –• Authentic learning• Biodiversity learning• Class room learning outside class room• Demonstrative learning• Experiential Learning

Authentic LearningSteve Revington defines authentic learning as real life learning that encourages students to create a tan-gible, useful output to be shared with their world. Instead of vicariously discussing topics and regur-gitating information in a traditional modality, stu-dents indulge in real life tasks, or simulated tasks that provide them with opportunities to connect directly with the challenges of real world.

Our greatest short coming in education in past few years has been to ignore the brain research that affirms implementing multi-sensory activities, pur-suing meaningful tasks, and exploring a variety of skills that involve stimulation of the five senses. Neu-roscience shows that using all senses maximises the learning experience. Optimal learning is interacting, innovating, exploring, and collaborating for mean-ingful outcomes while having ample time to nurture a greater depth of reasoning.

In an authentic learning model the emphasis is on the quality of process and innovation. It’s about allow-ing students to pursue individual learning opportuni-ties that are unique to their interests, through real life processes. It’s about engaging in activities that stu-dents care about and can be immersed in a meaning-ful experience.

Bio-diversity learningThe academic curriculum in science talks about spe-cies of plants, birds, and animals. But the course books and even the modern visual stimulation based learn-ing systems do not give practical experience. Thus nature walks and rural travel has to be a part of the education system. The United Nations Development Programme on education can help us better under-stand the value of biodiversity and the causes of bio-diversity loss. It also gives examples of how educators and students can help conserve biodiversity. It aims to increase public awareness of biodiversity issues by inspiring stakeholders, including young people, teachers and media professionals.

One country alone cannot achieve sustainable development. It requires an intentional and sincere international effort. Indigenous knowledge systems developed with long and close interaction with nature should drive the modern knowledge systems. Scien-tific knowledge of the Earth’s history and mineral resources, knowledge of ecosystems and biodiver-sity, and the interaction of humans with ecosystems are important to help us understand how to manage our planet for a peaceful and sustainable future.

Activities like river rafting nature trails, Kayaking not only stimulate the child physically it gives a sense of responsibility to keep the rivers clean.

Classroom learning outside classroomTraditionally, the education system in India was Gurukul based with Guru shishyaparampara as its pivot. Teachers like Droncharya or Vishwamitra wanted their students to learn from nature, which, in modern terms we call Wilderness education.

Several countries are now adopting to learn out-side of the classroom. This kind of education system states that every young person (0-19yrs) should expe-rience the world beyond the classroom as an essential part of learning and personal development, whatever their age, ability or circumstances.

The next section below talks about practical implementation of Responsible tourism and role of a Responsible tour operator. However, before a stu-dent embarks on a journey to explore the world, it is imperative to get well versed with his own country and its people. Work of a Responsible tour operator is not only to build travel arrangements, accommoda-tion, and coordinate a programme. Their work encom-passes direct benefit to the social, financial and envi-ronmental well being of a place and its people. Their work is to design best practices, deliver trainings, standardisation of sustainable processes and initia-tives at grass root level to enhance micro-entrepre-neurship with minimal impact on environment and bio-diversity.

Students at a very young age require the knowl-edge, skills and understanding to live in and contrib-ute to a global society. This begins with an under-standing of the world in which we live, including the

languages, values and cultures of different societies.These activities help to develop self-esteem, self-

confidence, decision making and independence. They also give young people the opportunity to experience other cultures, meet and develop new friendships and thus broaden their horizons, communication and leadership skills and practical knowledge.

Demonstrative LearningDemonstrations can be used to provide examples that enhance lectures and to offer effective hands-on, inquiry-based learning opportunities in classes or labs. Current research suggests that not allowing young people to engage in independent mobility and environmental learning denies them the opportunity to develop the skills and resilience that they need to be able to be safe and manage complex environments. There are also indications that such restrictions have long-term implications for young people’s future development, health and well-being.

It is sometimes argued that exposing young people to any risk is dangerous. In fact, the opposite is true. Teaching young people to manage risks for themselves and take sensible decisions makes them safer. It also helps them to develop as mature adults, responsible and mindful of others.

Learning outside the classroom helps young peo-ple to develop the ability to cope with and experience a wide variety of challenges. It requires them to make informed choices and to understand and take respon-sibility for the consequences. It leads to a positive

‘can-do’ attitude. Risk and challenge can be provided in all learning outside the classroom contexts – from activities within school grounds, to adventurous expe-ditions overseas.

The challenges which young people face in many learning activities outside the classroom require the management of risk. Managing risk through appro-priate planning, supervision, proper equipment and a regard for other factors such as the weather or the time of day is what contributes to making these activi-ties safe for young people while still offering sufficient challenge. These activities not only give young people the opportunity to manage risk for themselves, but also provide wonderful opportunities for them to be actively involved in risk management planning.

Experiential LearningIt is a philosophy and methodologies in which edu-cators purposefully engage with students in direct experience and focused reflection in order to increase knowledge, develop skills, and clarify values. Experi-ential learning is also referred to as learning through action, learning by doing, learning through experi-ence, and learning through discovery and explora-tion, all which are clearly defined by these well known maxims:

• Experiential learning occurs when carefully chosen experiences are supported by reflection, critical anal-ysis and synthesis• Experiences are structured to require the student to take initiative, make decisions and be accountable for results• Throughout the experiential learning process, the student is actively engaged in posing questions, inves-tigating, experimenting, being curious, solving prob-lems, assuming responsibility, being creative and con-structing meaning• Students are engaged intellectually, emotionally, socially, soulfully and/or physically. This involve-ment produces a perception that the learning task is authentic• The results of the learning are personal and form the basis for future experience and learning• Relationships are developed and nurtured: student to self, student to others and student to the world at large• The instructor and student may experience suc-cess, failure, adventure, risk-taking and uncertainty, because the outcomes of the experience cannot totally be predicted• Opportunities are nurtured for students explore and examine their own values• The instructor’s primary roles include setting suit-able experiences, posing problems, setting boundar-ies, supporting students, insuring physical and emo-tional safety, and facilitating the learning process.

Realising the change – Experiences from a traveller and entrepreneur in Responsible Travel

You will instantly relate to this if you are a parent. In the race to give your children the best modern educa-tion, have your children somewhere lost the connec-tion to their land and its people? Are your children spending too much time on internet, phone, video games and less time playing real games outside? Are they facing relationship issues because all that they have experienced in the name of relationships is ran-dom friend requests and post likes on Facebook? Do they have lack of clarity about what to do in life, lack of patience, lack of capability to solve problems inde-pendently and lack of tolerance to life’s issues? Do you think that the more you try to give a direction to your child’s life, the more your child resists it as

unnecessary and unwanted preaching?I was once leading a workshop on travel writing

for students when I asked them about where the veg-etables and fruits come from? I was surprised to see blank faces. The students did not know that we get our food from farms. The students belonged to one of the top university of India. It makes me re-think about the kind of education we are delivering. When I asked them about what they wanted to become, they responded with answers like – Lawyer, Entrepre-neur, Businessmen, or Engineer. But when I asked them about how their choice of career will benefit the people and what skills will they develop to solve peo-ple’s problems, they did not have an answer. They had never thought this way.

Students go through extreme pressure of stud-ies, of building a career and earn a living, of getting influenced by glamorous life without knowing the hard work behind it. It is also important to keep them grounded. But that does not happen by giving them daily pep talks. It comes by exposing the children to various facets of life. And the best way to expose them to it is via travelling. Allow them to travel to far flung places in India and live with local communities. Allow them to meet new people and discover new places that no one has ever heard of. Allow them to volun-teer, make mistakes, fall and then make things right themselves. Allow them to go through a process of self discovery.

But why should we do it? Parents have often asked me this question with a look of bewilderment on their face. They often ask me – Are you saying that trav-elling is more important than marks in school sub-jects? Are you saying that we should ask children to leave studies and wander off to unknown places? I cer-tainly don’t mean to say any of those. What if I tell you to expose them to the right kind of travel experience that makes them learn life skills?

That is where Responsible Travel comes in picture. I visited Kumaon back in 2012 with a group of Ameri-can students. We lived the lives of a local and each daily activity taught us a new lesson. We started with gath-ering food from the farms, cooked, and then served it to everyone in the village while the women sang local songs. I remember one American girl crying out loud. She had never experienced a sense of commu-nity and love. She hailed from a dysfunctional family where her parents never got along well and lived sep-arately (although not divorced). She had gotten used to do each and everything in her life on her own. She had grown to be a person who was smart, strong and independent from outside but lonely and scared from inside.

During her interaction with the village community of Kumaon, she experienced the sense of belonging-ness and love. Although she was only a teenage girl, she had stayed away from the child inside her. She shared that she was now able to happily accept peo-ple into her life without the barriers of their economic background, race, religion and geographical location. She experienced a freedom which will catapult her career and life to another level. She had gone beyond the negative news pieces that she heard daily. She has gone beyond the barriers which people put around us by telling us how bad this world is. For the first time she wanted to go back home and hug her parents. She no longer had the need to be independent, strong (and alone) but a part of a community.

It has taken us years of hard work and sleepless yet excited nights to gather the still miniscule knowledge we have in Responsible travel. We have implemented standard operating procedures which include safety, responsible travel, sanitation, safety and a responsi-ble system to distribute money that our customers pay. When children on our trips learn with excitement the basic practices of waste management, it leaves us with a satisfaction of having made a change in society. They also learn respect, contribution, living in a community, leadership, communication and love.

The west is currently going through the turmoil of broken relationships and lack of direction in life. Iron-ically, we are teaching our children to follow the west. I have got the best education in a convent school and then in an engineering college. According to what they said, I was ready to take on any challenge in life. Let alone any challenge of life, I wasn’t even ready to take on any challenge in my job when I completed engineer-ing. I had grown up to be a person that hated India and wanted to migrate at the first opportunity. I had grown to be a self centred and arrogant person. The initial enthusiasm of getting a new job somehow helped me push through the first three years. But soon I was left with a sense of no direction, confusion, suffocation and other emerging societal pressures. My conventional education hadn’t given me skills to deal with such sit-uations, but five years of travelling did. I gladly steered my career towards travel writing but not every student or a freshman in job gets a chance to do so. Why not train our children at a very early age?

Now what next? As a parent if you are consider-ing exposing your child to life’s learning skills through responsible travelling, the next question is – ‘How’. Such a travel experience would generally take them through activities like exposure to local communities, wilderness education, training on communication and observation skills, volunteering, farming, exposure to environment issues, training on living a balanced and sustainable lifestyle and many more that develop their holistic personality. You can begin by approach-ing your child’s school and asking them if they do such activities. The Folk Tales (www.thefolktales.com) pro-vides career growth, entrepreneurship and leader-ship programmes for children that are activity based and trains children in life skills through Responsible Travel. You can begin by enrolling your child into one of such trips.

As parents we have seen tough times and have worked hard to earn a living. Naturally, we want our children to get the best. But in that process, do not for-get to make them street smart. Make them a prob-lem solver and an innovator, not a mere follower of the masses.

Responsible TouRism • TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 29

TRAVEL NEWS DIGEST | APRIL 2016 • 30EVENTS

IMEX Frankfurt 2016 promises valuable business opportunities, great connections and fresh thinking

David Dubois, Immediate Past Chair of the Convention Industry Council and President & CEO of IAEE, is set to deliver the keynote at the opening ceremony of IMEX in Frankfurt, launching three days of business opportunities, network-ing and a comprehensive education programme. The show, taking place from April 19 to 21 at Messe Frankfurt, has been developed following feedback from buyers and exhibitors and is designed to address some of the hot topics in the meetings and events sector.

More for Hosted Buyers

More than 20 new hosted buyer groups from around the world are set to attend IMEX Frankfurt 2016. These include buyers from the U.S., Poland, China, South Africa and South America, plus UNICEO – the network for corporate event deci-sion makers. ISES (International Special Events Society) is also bringing their Global Event Summit to the show for the first time.

Revised group appointment timings will give buyers more time to explore the show floor, discovering new exhibitors, education and networking opportuni-ties – the show will now open at 9.45 am local time, with no group appointments scheduled before 11 am or after 4 pm.

Buyers can meet numerous new exhibitors such as Sardinia, Catalunya Con-vention Bureau, Wyndham Hotels, Condor Airlines, Variety Cruises and ESA Central & South America. Many established exhibitors have expanded their stand space, including Sri Lanka, Serbia, New Zealand, Hong Kong and Portugal; and hotel groups – Hilton International, Maritim Hotels and Preferred Hotels.

Topical educationWith over 180 education sessions at IMEX Frankfurt 2016, visitors are sure to find sessions that match their needs. The Inspiration Hub, home to all the show floor education, will host experts exploring Business Skills, Creative Learning, Diversity, General Education, Health and Wellbeing, Marketing / Social Media, Personal Development, Sustainability, Technology, Trends and Research. CMP / CEU and ISES Points can also be accrued at many sessions. New for this year is a series of short and snappy talks focused on ‘Trends and Future-Think’. These TED-style talks brought to IMEX in Frankfurt by the Swedish Network of Con-vention Bureaus, promise to introduce an ‘innovative Swedish interactive learn-ing experience’.

The sharing economy is a hot topic at the show this year, explored through the comprehensive education programme including a panel session of sharing economy pioneers discussing: How can we work with the new sharing economy? Senior representatives from MeetingRooms.com, VizEat and Maritz Travel Com-pany will detail their experiences and explore how the ‘old’ and new economies can work together for mutual benefit. Jean-Michel Petit, CEO and Co-Founder

of VizEat, the European leader of social dining, will further explore the shared economy, particularly food tourism and authenticity, in his session: The unex-pected power of shared meals.

‘Business is Personal’ is another major area of focus with sessions designed to help buyers and exhibitors to grow and develop both professionally and per-sonally. Business Skills and Personal Development educational tracks explore this theme with sessions on leadership skills, developing confidence and foster-ing strong connections. Jonathan Bradshaw delivers ‘The Meetology’ guide to influence and persuasion while Laura Richey from WINiT (WomenInTravel) shares her advice on ‘dealing with challenging people’.

There are also numerous ways for both buyers and exhibitors to join the Busi-ness is Personal theme off the show floor, via meditation and yoga sessions in the new Be Well Lounge (supported by Weichlein Tours + Incentives and Munich Convention Bureau), or by joining others for an energetic start to the day at the IMEXrun, sponsored by Rio de Janeiro.

Fresh from its success at IMEX America, the Play Room will host its interac-tive ‘quirkshops’ at IMEX in Frankfurt. ‘Play with a Purpose’ brings this new fea-ture to the show, providing a creative, interactive, hands-on “play space” designed to provide a fresh look at meeting planning.

Dedicated features

As part of the show’s comprehensive education programme, PCMA Business School is bringing its prestigious Business School to Europe for the first time alongside IMEX in Frankfurt. Hosted by Congress Center of Messe Frankfurt, this free of charge programme is open to all and offers executives the chance to develop core business skills and learn from an MBA level professor.

Exclusively Corporate @IMEX is a dedicated education and networking event solely for corporate meeting and event planners. Leading business strategist, Dr Kaihan Krippendorff, will deliver a keynote on how to develop ‘mental agility’, sharing insights from his study of over 200 successful innovators. At a Mock Trial, new for this year, participants can turn their hand to becoming prosecu-tion and defence lawyers exploring a real, ethical scenario in an authentic court-room setting in an engaging, entertaining educational session.

A dedicated education and networking event for exclusively for association executives, Association Day, attracts around 300 professionals from 40 countries each year. This year’s collaborative programme has been developed in response to issues raised by participants at last year’s event – how to remain relevant. Charles Leadbeater is set to harness this in his keynote address. As a leading authority on innovation and creativity, he has advised companies, cities and gov-ernments across the globe and is regarded as one of the top management think-ers worldwide.

Finally, the renowned Politicians Forum brings together up to 40 politicians and political influencers with around 80 industry leaders to discuss building and sustaining a successful meetings industry. This year the keynote speaker is Stu-art Ayres, Minister for Trade, Tourism and Major Events for New South Wales detailing ‘How Meetings and Events Can Fulfil Political Optimism.’

INDIA 02 AsIA 10 mIDDle eAst 12 europe 13 …...Hyatt Regency Gurgaon, New Delhi NCR. P# 22 Asian airports report passenger growth driven by China & India in 2015 P# 25 Ranveer Singh

Documents