More than 5,000 visitors were also there to witness the opening ceremony. Speaking on the occasion, Kamel said the festival would be a major boost to Jeddah’s diverse economic and commercial activities. He said all preparations are in place to receive the huge number of tourists and visitors to the historic city.
“Some 192 hotels with a total of 11,004 rooms of various star ratings as well as 670 furnished apartment buildings with 13,561 housing units have been readied to receive the visitors. In addition to this, some 76 tourism parks, 14 amusement cities, 205 commercial centers, 15 museums, 90 sports centers, 194 travel and tourism agencies, 480 restaurants and 84 rent a car companies are also geared up to make the event a great success,” he said.
Highlighting the growing role of shopping and tourism sectors in strengthening the Kingdom’s economy, Kamel said these sectors should be tapped fully to boost the Kingdom’s economy as well as to diversify the sources of national income apart from creating more job opportunities. “Various studies showed the Kingdom’s domestic and foreign tourist spending reached SR35 billion. According to the latest studies, the number of tourists and pilgrims who visited the Kingdom last year alone stood at 20 million,” he said adding tourist spending during the year accounted for SR1 billion.
Sheikh Kamel said 3 million tourists are expected to visit various religious, archaeological and tourist destinations in the Kingdom during this year’s season. “They include 1 million from within the Kingdom and 1 million each from the GCC and Arab states and from other countries,” he said. The shopping festival is organized by JCCI in cooperation with the Saudi Commission for Tourism and Antiquities (SCTA) and several other business sectors.
Speaking to Arab News, a number of economists and experts said the festival would take Jeddah to a much higher level with regard to economic and tourism activities as well as attracting more investments. They pointed to the latest figures showing the volume of tourist investments in Jeddah reached SR60 billion.
Loay Nazir, chairman of the Jeddah Marketing Center, said the shopping festival would play a vital role in boosting commercial activities in Jeddah. “The festival is focusing on providing quality events that match the soaring reputation of Jeddah as a pioneering city of festivals not only in the region but on an international level. A special feature of the Kingdom’s tourism sector is that its environment covers religion, nature, amusements and shopping, a situation seldom observed in other countries,” Nazir said, adding the tourism sector would be the major beneficiaries of the festival.
Around 1,000 tourist, amusement and cultural programs and business activities as well as from contests and games will be held on the sidelines of the 30-day festival. Aquatic sports, colorful folk performances and optical illusion shows in addition to acrobatic feats and stage performances will also be organized.
