Saudi Arabia, the Middle East's largest economy, plans to attract 88 million tourists and generate more than SR100 billion ($27 billion) in tourism revenue by 2020, a top official said on Saturday. “We're planning to be a major tourist destination in the coming years,” Prince Sultan Bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud, President and Chairman of the Saudi Commission for Tourism and Antiquities, told the Arabian Hotel Investment conference in Dubai. Up to last year, the Kingdom, which is home to Islam's two holiest sites, attracted 47 million tourists and generated SR74 billion in tourism revenue, he said. Saudi Arabia is also planning to boost its number of hotel rooms to over 250,000, compared with 117,097 last year, Prince Sultan said, adding that capital investment in tourism, which reached SR16 billion last year, was set to increase to SR38 billion by 2020. Prince Sultan said the plans would increase jobs in the tourism industry to 1.5 million by 2020. “These numbers are conservative and could turn out to be a lot higher,” he said. “The biggest problem we have is the amount of Saudi Arabian's traveling abroad,” Prince Sultan said. “We need to encourage them to stay at home.” Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia received on Wednesday an invitation to participate in the Arab Tourism Conference set to be held on May 27-28 in Sana'a. The invitation of Tourism Minister Nabil al-Faqih was handed over on Wednesday by the Yemeni ambassador to KSA Mohammed Al-Ahwal to the chairman of Saudi Commission for Tourism and Antiquities Sultan bin Salman. It invited the Saudi official to participate in the 12th round of Arab Tourism Ministers meetings which would be held next May in Sana'a. The annual Saudi Travel and Tourism Investment Market 2009 (STTIM) held recently in Riyadh showcased tourism investment opportunities in the Kingdom and for five days bore the slogan “Tourism for All – Partnership for sustainable development” During STTIM, 29 speakers took turns addressing tourism investment topics across four major sessions and reviewed major international experiences in the field of hotels, travel, tourism, tourism investment initiatives and programs, tourism destinations investment, as well as exhibitions, conferences, and media tourism. “This is a platform for exchanging opinions on key issues related to tourism and the travel industry, including investments in the sector” said Prince Sultan Bin Salman at the conference. “The tourism industry globally would recover and be stronger than many other sectors despite global recession. “In the Kingdom, all our tourism projects and initiatives have been launched and are operational.”
