The Ministry of Transportation vowed to go after businesses that organize unauthorized sightseeing trips to historic and archaeological sites.

Unofficial statistics indicate that the Kingdom is losing more than SR 1 billion in annual revenues because there is no institutional structure to the industry.

Muhammad Madani, director of roads and transportation in Makkah, said the government is moving to regulate the industry.

“The culture of organizing sightseeing trips is new to the Saudi society,” he said. “Usually it takes years before the idea is internalized to the degree that it acquires a systematic nature.”

He added: “There are three government agencies working together to promote the concept of organized sightseeing trips. We have already established special touristic buses, especially in the two holy cities, and we have now trained guides.”

He urged tourists to deal only with trained and authorized guides licensed by the Saudi Commission for Tourism & Antiquities (SCTA).

“We are working on new regulations regarding the historic and archaeological places, and we will issue rules for detecting violators, imposing fines, and establishing penalties,” he said.

Khalid Bahia, head of Bahia Travels in Madinah, said his company organizes trips to 73 historic sites in Madinah after the company obtained the license to do so from SCTA, and from religious scholars, as well as archaeologists and history scholars.

“The reason for going to these authorities,” he said, “is to make sure that that our guides give true historic descriptions.”

He added: “We organize trips from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., and our guides speak five languages: English, Arabic, Urdu, French, and Farsi.” He said. “For this purpose, we recruited professional translators with a background in tourism. These trips are like a historic tale, and our guides must be able to tell it in an authentic way. They have, for example, to explain to the tourist how Badr and Uhud, the first two major battles in Islam, were conducted and fought.”

Khalid Al Qarhi, a guide in Makkah, said: “Religious site-seeing is very popular with Haj and Umrah visitors. The authorities do not adequately facilitate the job of the trip organizers. This would lead some people to do the job in unprofessional and irregular ways.”