World-class products to bolster domestic tourism

As part of a comprehensive drive to make domestic tourism a major contributor to the national economy, the Saudi Commission for Tourism and Antiquities (SCTA) has undertaken various initiatives to get maximum mileage out of national airlines and other components of the transportation sector with the onset of summer.
The SCTA also launched the Kingdom’s summer events here on Sunday.
Riyadh Gov. Prince Khaled bin Bandar and SCTA Chairman Prince Sultan bin Salman took part in a ceremony at Diriyah (Riyadh) marking the launch of summer festival.
The plan is to introduce a range of world-class products and services among Saudi nationals and residents, which will go a long way in promoting domestic tourism in the Kingdom.
On the other hand, the tourism promotion drive launched by Prince Sultan recently was meant to ensure that domestic airlines give priority to the local tourist traffic instead of serving the outbound citizens and expatriates going on vacation.
Besides the airlines, SCTA has launched a slew of other measures, which include financing tourism projects, streamlining the services and infrastructure facilities, besides exploring the possibility of a new umbrella organization to harness tourism potential in the Kingdom.
There is a growing realization of the multiplier effect of domestic tourism on the economy in terms of job creation, boost to the construction, transportation and ancillary industries.
No wonder, the starting point of this orchestrated drive includes fine-tuning the operational and marketing strategy, construction of additional housing units, providing quality tourist accommodation and upgrading local tourism services.
Complementing the effort is the use of Internet and social network media to enlighten the citizens on tourist attractions in the Kingdom.
“Know your country” and virtual reality tours represent the other side of this multi-dimensional approach.
Against this backdrop, the SCTA chairman met with senior officials of the domestic and national airlines in preparation for the summer vacation.
The meeting was to ensure the availability of flights for domestic tourists during the same period, when citizens usually spend their summer holidays within the Kingdom.
Prince Sultan called on the domestic airlines to give priority to local tourists by increasing domestic flights during summer.
He underlined the impact of local tourism on the national economy in general and Saudi nationals in particular.
For this reason, the prince said, the national carriers are also partners in domestic tourism.
While delivering this message at the Sixth Saudi Forum on Travel and Tourism Investment — 2013, Prince Sultan stated that the commission foresees new government initiatives for financing tourism projects and services to make the industry sustainable.
This year was exceptional for the tourism industry in view of the structural changes to strengthen the base of the industry, he said.
These measures had become necessary in the absence of an umbrella organization that could bring all sectors of tourism-oriented services together.
The five-day event was organized by SCTA from March 31-April 4 this year with the support of the Riyadh governor, who is also chairman of the Tourism Development Council in the Riyadh region.
“The new airport projects, in addition to the new fleet of Saudi Arabian Airlines, and the entry of new companies in the domestic travel market, would be a major supporter of the increased domestic flights and stimulate tourist traffic between the interior regions of the Kingdom next year,” he added.
Prince Sultan also underlined the importance of the recent decision of the Council of Ministers to launch a comprehensive program for streamlining the operations of service centers and gas stations on highways.
Such measures would encourage citizens to travel by road and ease pressure on domestic flights.
Khalid Al-Melhem, director-general of Saudi Arabian Airlines, said after the meeting that the national air carrier was ready to cope with the summer rush for domestic flights during vacation.
He referred to the purchase of 65 new aircraft over the past three years that will help ease pressure on domestic flights during summer.
The airline has also stepped up its efforts to ensure that its fleet is operational thanks to the maintenance work undertaken before the start of summer.
Travel agencies have also launched their own spring cleaning operations.
These measures have ramped up the volume of sales in the domestic tourism sector to over SR 16.8 billion last year, from SR 15.1 billion in 2010.
Experts argue that though the market has been growing steadily, there is a need to streamline the operational and marketing strategy in order to sustain the momentum of growth.
A tourism panel set up in this context has stressed the need for an association that will safeguard the interests of workers and address the sector’s problems in coordination with IATA.
Labor reforms are deemed to be of crucial importance along with tourism development strategies for promoting domestic tourism and channeling investments in this sector, which also has an immense potential for absorbing Saudi manpower.
Statistics released by MAS show that after the government sector, the tourism industry is the second biggest employer with 26 percent of the total Saudi work force.
According to Prince Sultan, the tourism sector in Saudi Arabia is expected to have additional 38,000 housing units and 50,000 rooms over the next three to five years.
“This year we expect some crucial decisions from the leadership, including the establishment of specialized companies with government support,” he observed.
At another level, national airlines and tour operators mapped out a joint strategy for organizing field trips for students under the “Know your country” program, which will be implemented by SCTA in partnership with the Ministry of Education, Ministry of Higher Education, Saudi Arabian Airlines and tour operators.
To this end, SCTA has launched virtual reality tours to educate citizens, especially the youth, on tourist attractions, heritage sites like Madain Saleh and ancillary services (hotels or restaurants), that can visually demonstrate the Kingdom’s competitive strengths through e-tourism.
The virtual tours project seeks to develop a mechanism to enhance public awareness about tourism in Saudi Arabia.
The project explores a new way of promoting heritage tourism by making use of three-dimensional models of panoramic images accompanied by sound, light and animation techniques.
There is a bright scope for creating job opportunities for Saudi students of computer graphics and animation in view of the top priority accorded to the tourism sector.
Saudi Arabia has unveiled plans to build a $ 13 billion ‘tourist city’ in Al-Oqair, south of Alkhobar on the eastern coast.
According to Prince Sultan, the first phase of the $ 27 million Al-Oqair project will create 80,000 jobs for Saudi men and women.
“Al-Ahsa municipality will have a 25 to 30 percent stake in the project and will be in partnership with SCTA,” Prince Sultan told Al-Yaum Arabic daily.
The road map of the future tourism projects was announced last year on the occasion of the Travel and Tourism Investment Market 2012 (TTIM) where one of the sessions was on the theme of “new trends in travel and tourism.”
In the light of the expansion plan, the seminar also dwelt on the related aspects of the mega project.
They underlined the need for establishing a new entity that will work in coordination with the IATA. One of the objectives would also be to safeguard the interests of workers in this sector and discuss their problems in the broad interest of the tourism industry.
On the marketing side, the thrust of the debate was on utilizing the new technology for online and electronic reservations in addition to direct sales through various outlets in the Kingdom and abroad.
According to Abdullah Abu Khamseen, member of the board of directors of Yusuf Ahmed Kanoo, the market for travel agencies and tourism has remained dynamic.
This is borne out by the sales volume of SR 16.86 billion in 2011, as against SR 15.1 billion in 2010, an increase of 11 percent. He referred to the anticipated high income of the agencies amounting to SR 1.06 billion in 2010 to 1.18 billion in 2011 to prove this point.
Besides streamlining the sales, SCTA is also paying attention to tourism-related services, which was the focus of another high profile forum on Saudi Travel and Tourism Investment in Riyadh.
The commission, by classification of tourist accommodation facilities, monitors quality control of its services.
Thus, it weeds out services that are not up to the mark to ensure quality control in the growth and development of the hotel and tourism industry.
The classification criteria for various tourist accommodation facilities are meant to ensure safety, security and quality in the delivery of service as per the norms specified in the classification criteria for hotels in the Kingdom.
To adopt these standards, the president of the commission had issued decree No 4455 dated 24-7-1429 requiring the hospitality industry to abide by them.
The seminar brought to the fore another important aspect for the balanced growth of tourism. Musaed Al-Musained, professor of planning and engineering at King Saud University, said the tourism sector cannot be sustainable without transportation, which again depends on toning up the transportation services locally and globally through forward and backward linkages.
He referred to the direct relationship between improvement in local tourism services and investments in the transportation sector.
At the same time, it is equally important to curb the operational cost, especially in the air travel segment.
Al-Musained underlined the need for proper planning and execution of tourism-related schemes while referring to SCTA statistics which show that the number of tourists is projected to increase from 50 million in 2005 to an estimated 60 million by 2020.
Overall, these initiatives augur well for the future of domestic tourism in the Kingdom under the dynamic leadership of Prince Sultan bin Salman.