ArmInfo.Armenia plans to increase the y-o-y number of tourists visiting Armenia to 15 million people. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan stated on August 3 during a discussion of amendments to the law "On Tourism" and related laws, noting that the goal is realistic if a tourist returning from Armenia recommends others to visit Armenia.
As Deputy Minister of Economy Rafayel Gevorgyan stated, presenting the draft law, the field is still regulated by the 2003 regulation. Meanwhile, over the past two decades, the field has undergone significant changes and along with its dynamic development, various challenges have arisen. In addition, the tourism sector of the Republic of Armenia in H1 2023 registered an unprecedented - 30% visitor increase compared to 2019, which is considered the best tourist year for Armenia. Compared to the first half of last year, the growth was 68%, he explained.
As a result, an objective need arose to introduce new regulations, consonant with the current growth rates of the field, which will come to protect the interests of consumers and ensure the appropriate quality of services provided, the Deputy Minister said.
In this vein, in particular, it is proposed: to make activities in the field of providing tourist services s notifiable; in order to specify the conditions for the provision of services in the field of tourism and the introduction of mechanisms for monitoring them, clear criteria will be established for persons providing tourism services; established requirements for the training and retraining of guides, as well as requirements for tourist information centers and the possibility of voluntary qualification for tourist buses; powers and functions of state bodies are defined. In order to prevent and eliminate violations of the requirements of the legislation regulating the tourism sector, it is planned to conduct state control over compliance with the requirements of the legislation and administrative response to violations.
A number of provisions of the law will come into force on June 30, 2024, the rest - on June 30, 2025. Pashinyan, in his turn, pointing out the need to raise the quality of the services provided in the sector to a new level, noted that tourism is one of the sectors where not everything depends on the organization involved in this sector. Transport services are also important, for example, raising the standard of taxi services is key, he said.
"In the near future, we have to solve very serious problems with our airport, since I recently received a certificate stating that in the first half of this year, compared to the first half of last year, the number of passengers using the services of the airport has almost doubled, and it has increased by about per 1 million 200 thousand people. Can you imagine what this number is for our republic? This means that our airport, in fact, is already working at the limit of its capabilities or a little beyond these capabilities>, the prime minister said.
According to him, in this regard it is necessary to make strategic decisions in this area. "On the other hand, it is necessary to ensure the development of tourism infrastructures in the county's regions as well. I am happy to say that we are already recording it. Obviously, a significant part of the regions is developing very actively in this regard. Here, the talent of our businessmen, entrepreneurs and the Armenian people as a whole is very clearly manifested, and we have new manifestations here>, the Prime Minister concluded.
"As part of the Medium-Term Expenditure Program, huge funds are planned to be spent on the development of tourism infrastructure over the next three years," Armenian Finance Minister Vahe Hovhannisyan added. In particular, the authorities plan to spend about 10 billion drams annually for these purposes.
It should be noted that according to the Committee on Tourism, in Q1 2023, 1 million tourists visited Armenia, which is almost 2 -fold higher than the figure of a year ago. Traditionally, the lion's share of tourists (52% or 519 thousand) are citizens of the Russian Federation, followed by tourists from Georgia - 115 thousand (11%), Iran - 58 thousand (6%), USA- 16.6 thousand (2%). During the reporting period, tourists from Ukraine, India, Germany, France, Belarus, China, etc. also visited Armenia. At the same time, in June alone, the number of tourists in Armenia reached almost 200,000, which exceeds the figure of a year ago by 53.3%, and on monthly terms - by 13%.
For the whole of 2022, 1.67 million tourists visited Armenia, 2-fold higher than the figure of a year ago.
