Expert: Recovery of tourism revenues should be expected in April 2021

ArmInfo. Under the most  optimistic scenario, the restoration of the main tourism industry in  Armenia should be expected in April next year. A similar opinion on  May 19 during the working discussions in the Parliament with the  participation of representatives of the tourism industry was stated  by the Head of the Tourism Federation of the Republic of Armenia  Mehak Apresyan.  At the same time, he emphasized that from the end of  August and the beginning of September of this year a gradual  resumption of tourist inflows is already possible. In particular,  Apresyan noted that the tourism sector received the most severe blow  from the coronavirus epidemic, the subjects of which have completely  lost their income, and this is in the presence of many credit and tax  obligations. Having greeted the government's measures aimed at  mitigating the socio-economic consequences of the pandemic, which, he  said, had been taken quite quickly, the head of the Federation  emphasized that state assistance, as it turned out, had not affected  the tourism sector.

"The tourism sector has features, and if we want support measures in  the tourism industry to be more targeted, it is imperative to take  them into account," Apresyan said. In this regard, he emphasized that  the Tourism Federation, having analyzed the problems of the sphere,  developed proposals for supporting the industry, and submitted them  to the government.

The head of the Federation noted that all anti-crisis government  packages that market players could take advantage of are not  practical and need to be amended. Therefore, as Apresyan noted, there  is a need to develop a separate package of anti-crisis measures  specifically for the tourism industry.

In addition, the expert, who led the field within the Ministry of  Economy for many years, emphasized that before the restoration of  international tourism it is necessary to work on stimulating domestic  tourism, which involves making changes at the institutional level. In  this regard, he referred to the need to develop a favorable fiscal  policy for this area.

It should be noted that, according to the Statistical Committee of  the Republic of Armenia, 311,264 people visited Armenia in the I  quarter (with a decline of 14.6% per annum), and 275 716 people left.  (with an annual decline of 13.3%).