Author: Tourism News live

Greece has opened its hotels, thereby kick-starting its tourism sector chained by weeks of lockdown. The hotels opened yesterday, June 1, with strict safety regulations in place. Business remained quiet because international flights from its main airports will only start from June 15. With borders remaining shut in key tourism markets, some hotels have decided to reopen later, due to low reservations. Following are a number of new rules that must be followed by all hotels in Greece, according to the government decision. – All hotel employees (including interns) must wear a face mask (surgical or cloth) and disposable gloves. ... Read more

There will be no price hike for package tours and routes in 2020, vice president of the Russian Travel Industry Union, Yuri Barzykin said in an interview. “Will the package tours and routes become more expensive this year? No, they will not be more costly,” he said. The domestic tourist traffic will recover by August in absence of the second wave of the coronavirus spread, Barzykin said. “However, according to estimates of specialists, the traffic will decline in the domestic market by 30-50%, although the outbound tourism will not operate,” he added. “I believe Europe will start opening for us ... Read more

The InterContinental Moorea Resort & Spa in the French Polynesia will close permanently, with its business suffering hugely due to the coronavirus pandemic. The resort’s area general manager Guillaume Epinette cited “unforeseeable market conditions resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic.” “The global health and economic downturn resulting from the novel coronavirus has had an exceptionally devastating impact on the travel and tourism industry,” said Epinette in a statement. “The permanent closure of the InterContinental Moorea Resort & Spa has been a very hard but carefully considered decision taken to preserve our other hotels within Pacific Beachcomber hotel group.” Pacific Beachcomber Hotels ... Read more

Coronavirus induced lockdown restrictions were eased on June 1 across the globe, especially in Asia and Europe, as demand for travel and tourism started to pick up. The Colosseum opened its doors in Rome, golfers played in Greece, students returned in Britain and Dutch bars and restaurants were free to welcome patrons again, news agency AP reported yesterday. Countries around the Mediterranean Sea began tentatively to kick-off a summer season in which tourists could bask in their famously sunny beaches while still being protected by social distancing measures. “We are reopening, as a symbol. A symbol of Rome, a symbol ... Read more

International passenger flights to and from India will not resume immediately, as the ban imposed by various countries on the entry of foreigners need to be addressed first, Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri has said. Domestic services were suspended in India due to the coronavirus-induced lockdown and resumed after a gap of two months on May 25. Scheduled international passenger flights continue to remain suspended in the country. “Numerous citizens have been approaching us to restart international flights. Several factors need to be addressed. Many international destinations are not allowing incoming passenger traffic, except for their own citizens or ... Read more

Singapore and China will launch a “fast lane” arrangement early next month to help encourage essential travel. The travel will be essentially for business and official purposes, as both countries emerge from the coronavirus pandemic with control measures in place. The arrangement would first apply to Singapore and six provinces or municipalities directly under the Chinese central government – Shanghai, Tianjin, Chongqing, Guangdong, Jiangsu and Zhejiang, said Singapore’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) in a statement. This arrangement will be gradually expanded to the other Chinese provinces and municipalities, according to a report by The Straits Times. Both countries agreed ... Read more

Travel agency Skyscanner’s chief executive officer (CEO) Bryan Dove has stepped down. Vice-chairperson Moshe Rafiah will take over the position. Dove, who has pent five years with the company, said he is stepping down for family reasons. He will remain as a senior adviser to the company. Skyscanner is a meta search engine and travel agency based in Edinburgh, Scotland and owned by Trip.com Group, the largest online travel agency in China. Rafiah said: “Bryan has made a remarkable impact on Skyscanner. While the travel industry faces a challenging time, Skyscanner is a leader in the sector in every way.” ... Read more

Hospitality firm Oyo is trying to assuage the hurt of its furloughed employees, by offering them employee stock ownership plans (ESOPs) worth around Rs 130 crore. An internal e-mail from its founder Ritesh Agarwal said the move is part of the company’s efforts to minimise the disruption experienced by these employees, news agency PTI said. On April 8, Agarwal had said in a letter that the company will place a certain number of employees on furloughs or temporary leaves, globally. In an internal town hall note to the impacted employees, Agarwal on Monday said that while he hoped that the ... Read more

DJ Hector Kerala Tourism often markets its rainy season as ‘Monsoon magic’, but this year there is no magic in sight. The India Meteorological Department (IMD) on Monday said the south-west monsoon has made an onset over Kerala, marking the start of the country’s four-month long rainy season. Pre-monsoon rains have already lashed many areas of the state, signalling the arrival of heavy downpour in the coming days. Tourists usually visit Kerala during monsoon to receive ayurvedic treatment. The weather is cooler, dust-free, with an overhang of moisture during this time. This helps in opening up the pores of the ... Read more

The Mexican Caribbean state of Quintana Roo is preparing to reopen itself to tourism from June 8, Governor Carlos Joaquin Gonzalez has announced. In the interim, area tourism and hospitality companies, particularly in the popular holiday hotspots of Cancun and Riviera Maya region, are bringing back employees to begin training in the ways of the “new normal”, Travel Pulse has reported. “We are getting ready to restart operations,” said Roberto Cintrón Gómez, president of the Hotel Association of Cancun, Puerto Morelos and Isla Mujeres. While Covid-19 has not yet been eradicated in the region, Quintana Roo has just instituted a new certification programme to help ... Read more

Seychelles, an archipelago of 115 islands in the Indian Ocean, has decided to welcome guests from select countries. The Seychelles Public Health Emergency Operations Centre (PHEOC) has identified a number of countries as low risk and in conducting its review, it considered the magnitude of transmission, trends in outbreak, responsiveness of the public health system, advisories from public health authorities and reliability of data. PHEOC recommended to the Public Health Commissioner that the following countries could be designated as low risk. Risk assessment is dynamic, and the list of countries will be kept under constant review and may be amended. ... Read more

Greek Tourism Minister Harry Theoharis has presented a new plan for the promotion of domestic tourism. To start with, there will be an increase in funding of the Greek Manpower Employment Organization’s (OAED) subsidised social tourism programme to 30 million euros. Second is a 10-million-euro tax relief programme for companies, so they in turn can provide holiday coupons to employees. The third is bringing back the ‘Tourism for All’ programme with a 30 million-euro budget, which provides subsidised holidays for the unemployed, pensioners, and others who qualify due to low income. Theoharis noted that some 70 million euros will be ... Read more

Major players in Canada’s tourism and travel sectors have formed a new coalition to restore the industry in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Called the Canadian Tourism Roundtable, the cross-Canadian coalition is calling on all levels of government to work together to streamline and clarify rules around travel in order to ensure safe, accessible and timely travel for Canadians as early as this summer. The Roundtable comprises leaders from various sectors, including airports, airlines, hotels, chambers of commerce and others. The $102 billion travel and tourism sector, which has been devastated by the pandemic, supports some 1.8 million workers ... Read more

Tourists can return to Florida Keys from today, after a gap of two months. Highway checkpoints will come down and visitors can once again hit all the restaurants and attractions, a Miami Herald report said. But it won’t exactly be the same as before the pandemic. There will be rules to follow. Here’s what you can and can’t do if you are planning to visit: Monroe County requires masks in public. They should be worn while inside a business, working in public, on public transportation and when around people besides immediate family. They can be taken off while eating in restaurants, ... Read more

The Dekho Apna Desh series, promoted by the Ministry of Tourism, talks about how India is best seen on a bicycle. Over to the cycling duo of Tejaswini Gopalaswamy and Gurdeep Ramakrishna, who run Unventured Expeditions: Having travelled to various parts of India and across different parts of the world, one of the things that makes us interested about India is that every 200 kms food, culture, the way the people speak or their way of life changes. That’s what inspires us to get out and travel and we have chosen the humble bicycle as the means to get around and explore India. So, I ... Read more