Mr. Mahyoub to the YT: About 25 thousand tourists expected to spend Christmas in Aden [Archives:2000/46/Interview]

Many countries hold tourism industry as a main source for national economy. In Yemen which possesses many beauties and tourist attractions tourism industry has gone through ups and downs causing a sharp fall in the number of tourists from 87,627 in 1998 to 58,370 in 1999 according to statistics of the General Authority of Tourism. Losses resulted from this fall has been estimated at US$ 600 million. Ironically, whenever authorities concerned are within an ace of abating consequences of a certain terrorist act or any act of sabotage that would globally tarnish Yemens image, another act takes place. The last of such acts has been targeting the USS Cole mooring in Aden for Fuel.
To what extent such incidents have been harmful to tourism in Yemen? For more in this prospectus the Yemen Times interviewed chairman of the General Authority of Tourism and came out with the following dialogue:
Q: What are Yemens main tourist attractions?
A: Yemen has a lot to offer for tourists. Reports by World Tourism Organization prove Yemens richness in tourist potentials.
Q: What are the most places frequented by tourists?
A: There are some places that have become familiar to tourists. These are Mareb, Baraqesh, Sayoun, Hadhramaut, Saadah, Shiharah, Kowkaban and Al-Mahweet.
Presently we are working on expansion of this map. There are tourist villages along tourist coasts in Khokha and Hadhramaut plus diving tourism in Kamaran, Beer Ali and Hadhramaut. We have plans to inaugurate desert tourism which will begin with an international cars and bikes rally. We have also plans to include medication by mineral and sulfur water which will be mainly intended for Arab tourists.
Q: What do antiquities mean to tourists?
A: Most sites frequented by tourists are historic. About 60% of tourists are over 55 years old. This sector of people is more interested in historic and ancient places such as Sanaa Al-Qadimah.
Q: Most tourist attractions are in remote areas, what kind of services are provided for tourists there?
A: The size of services available in tourist locations is little. We are doing our best to encourage and motivate the private sector to invest in this sphere. We will facilitate investment wither by investors or by inhabitants of those places. Unless this happens we will propagate for that on the Arab and foreign investors level.
Q: Do you think that the condition of historical places is satisfactory? How do you assess contribution of available antiquities to attracting visitors?
A: Yemen as a whole can be considered as buried treasures of antiquities. History tells about many buried ancient cities in Al-Jawf, Shabwa and others. We hear about discovering mummies from time to time. This issue should be taken seriously for it proves existence of a great ancient civilization parallel to that of pharaohs.
Q: Why Dont excavations take place in all Yemeni historical cities?
A: Excavations are expensive and need a lot of efforts beginning from researching, excavating and how to preserve the discoveries. Antiquities available constitutes only 5% of what Yemen possesses.
We feel worry about those discoveries for they sometimes mishandled or sold. We have recently heard about a very valuable piece of antique being sold in Al-Jawf. I think it is better to leave them in the womb of earth if we are not able to preserve them. But we are in need to show the world our civilization.
Q: Is there an enough cadre in the tourism sector?
A: There are about 450 employees in different positions. We are very concerned about qualifying our cadre. So we continuously organize training courses for them. Last month there was a training course for directors of the authoritys branches. Many other courses are to follow.
Q: How much have the security disturbance effected tourism? What kind of measures taken to avoid such disturbances?
A: Damage to tourism and national economy has taken many forms. The biggest damage resulted from the murder of some tourists in December 1998 in Abyan. This incident and others helped slow development of tourism in our country.
Despite all different incidents some tourists encountered during 1990-1997, there was a gradual rise in the number of tourists. It was that incident of December 1998 that greatly affected tourism and investment.
Various steps shave been taken to protect tourists and you can see that since 1999 no tourist has been kidnapped. Those kidnapped in this period live or work in Yemen.
You can see the volume of damage to tourism through the number of tourists arriving here in this year and compare it with our expectations. We were expecting about 200 thousand tourists to arrive from Europe. Only 90 thousand have come. We hope that this number will increase to 180-200 thousand in the coming year.
Q: The American as well as the British governments warned their citizens against traveling to Yemen after the explosions in the USS Cole and the British Embassy. Can you foresee the damage to tourism these incidents will cause?
A: We are sad for these two incidents. However, I hope they will not affect tourism. We usually receive up to 100 thousand tourists in winter. So far I have not been informed by any travel agency about canceling any reservation. It is expected that about 25 thousand French living in Djibouti would arrive in Aden to spend Christmas. Contacts are still going on with them in this regard. There are reservations for 10 thousand tourists who are expected to arrive in Yemen by the end of December 2000.
Q: Who are the most comers to Yemen?
A: German, Italian, French, Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, USA, UK and the Scandinavian countries. There are other tourists from Japan, Korea and Poland.
Q: How many American and British tourists arrive here?
A: Many British tourists visit Yemen. But we have a problem with American and Canadian tourists who require 4-5 star hotels. Those hotels are not yet available in remote countries. Generally we receive about 7 thousand tourists every year. Hopefully we have plans to build 7 5-star hotels in such areas.

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