The UAE is not worried about the impact of the regional political tension on the tourism sector as the country has high safety and security protocols, said Abdullah bin Touq Al Marri, Minister of Economy.
On the the second day of the Future Hospitality Summit in Dubai, the minister also stressed that the UAE’s tourism sector is growing year-on-year and also enjoys the highest occupancy level in the world, reflecting robust growth of the sector.
“The UAE and the region have been seeing crises for decades. The UAE leadership has an openness policy. We also have one of the highest safety and security policies. The UAE’s utmost safety protocols is something we are happy and proud of. We also see that tourism numbers are growing year-on-year also,” Al Marri said in response to a question about any concern regarding the regional conflict between Israel and Hezbollah at a conference on Tuesday.
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Last year, the UAE’s tourism sector contributed 12 per cent to the country’s GDP and provided around 800,000 jobs.
“My target is to increase the tourism sector’s contribution to 16 per cent. We are on the right track. We had about 73 million visitors managed by UAE airports in the first half of 2024. There are 1,200 hotels in UAE, hosting millions of visitors.
“Hotel occupancy reached 80 per cent in the first half which is the highest in the world. We see new talent coming in, F&B growing and the Michelin Star event happening in Abu Dhabi recently. There are a lot of events and things are happening,” said Al Marri.
The minister added that each emirate in the country has different competitive strategies and experiences to offer to visitors.
Israel and Hezbollah are currently locked in a military conflict that has now extended into Lebanon. On Tuesday, the Israeli military launched an invasion in Lebanon targeting Hezbollah.
However, many leaders in the hospitality industry believe that the Israel-Hezbollah conflict will have little to no impact on the Gulf region, as it remains confined to just those two parties.
Domestic tourism
Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, the UAE had 70 per cent international and 30 per cent domestic tourists.
“When CovId-19 hit globally, we lost that 70 per cent. We had to go back and see how to benefit from domestic tourism. We had to adapt. We were looking within the country of how to reach the 50-50 level and we have long school holidays, then winter break and there is a lot of spending happening. We decreased weekdays from 5 to four and a half days for economic perspective,” Al Marri recalled.
“When we looked at the potential of the domestic tourism, we launched the Coolest Winter Campaign. Domestic tourism is much sought-after in the UAE,” he added.