Category: Europe

Budapest, Hungary Tourism has become one of the major contributors to the GDP of Hungary these days. It was informed by Péter Szijjártó, Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade. He was talking to the media at the Dubrovnik Ministerial Conference on cooperation between China and 16 central and eastern Europian Countris. “Chinese are the world’s most affluent tourists; as per last year’s records they have spent around USD 258 billion, worldwide. So having more Chinese tourists to Hungary is highly beneficial for the country,” said Szijjarto. The inbound tourists form China last year were around  227,000, which was 34 per ... Read more

Aiming at boosting inbound tourism to the country, Romanian government is planning to establish 20 overseas tourist promotion offices. The proposal was set forth by the Tourism Ministry, stating that the offices will be opened in major markets of Romanian tourism and the offices will have two employees nominated by the ministry. “The new measure intensifies the efforts to promote Romania as a major tourist destination on an international level,” said Nelu Barbu, Government Spokesman to the media. The role of foreign representations will be to enhance the flow of foreign tourists to Romania, to facilitate and create new associations ... Read more

Photo Credits: gotnewswire India and the Netherlands could join hands for promoting medical tourism in both countries. It was suggested by Shirpad Yesso Nayik, Union minister of state for Ayush, while talking in a seminar titled ‘India-Netherlands Collaboration in Healthcare, including Ayurveda, at Leiden. “India is the world’s largest producer of generic medicine and there is tremendous potential for medical value travel to India for conventional and alternative medical treatments like Ayurveda,” said the minister. Alternative medical streams in India, named Ayush, denotes to medical treatments other than allopathic such as Ayurveda, Yoga, Unani, Siddha and homeopathy. Naik reiterated the ... Read more

National Tourist Board of Croatia has announced on Tuesday, 28th August 2018, that the European Travel Commission (ETC) has approved funds to Croatian and Slovenian tourism authorities for their joint promotion in China. The programme named “Experience Croatia, Feel Slovenia” is aiming at enhancing the visibility and reputation of the two counties in the Chinese market and presents them as ideal tourism destinations in European. The cost of the campaign is over 200,000 euros (USD 234,500), half of which have to be co-financed by ETC. The campaign, which will be conducted from October 2018 to March 2019, will have two ... Read more

Portugal’s tourism industry is in a positive swing as per the statistics revealed by the department of tourism. As per the records Portugal’s tourism revenues shows an increase of 13.9 per cent during the first six months of year compared with the same period last year. The total revenue from tourism was 6.9 billion euros during this period. March recorded the highest increase in tourism revenue with 20.3 per cent.  May has 19.5 per cent and February shows 16.1 per cent increase, during the first half of the year. “Tourist revenues in Portugal are growing 5 times more than the ... Read more

Art work by Georg Lowit The 17th edition of Sculptour, the renowned art event of Belgium, has been commenced on 1st May and will conclude by 23rd September 2018. The annual art event is happening at Kluisbergen municipality in the Belgian province of East Flanders. Sculptour is an art event aimed at professional artists from around the world to display their artworks. Several prominent sculptors from different countries have been taking part in this unique event.  It offers a big platform to the artists to draw the attention of a large amount of public who love contemporary arts. The focus ... Read more

Tourism has excelled the construction industry in Spain in terms of employment generation. As per a recent survey by the Spanish Institute of Tourism, 2.65 million people are engaged in different sectors of tourism, which represent around 13.7 percentage of the total population of the nation, meanwhile construction sector account for around 13.1 per cent. The demand for workers in the tourism sector has been steadily rising year by year. According to the survey, more than 2.2 million people were employed in tourism in the second during 2014, which has increased to 2.6 million now, depicting a hike of nearly ... Read more

The Bristol Balloon Fiesta makes its long-awaited return to Bristol’s Ashton Court this weekend and is sure to attract visitors from across the country. Bristol’s biggest annual festival is the largest hot air ballooning event in Europe and crowds of around 100,000 people are expected to descend on Ashton Court each day. The festival runs from August 9-12, with its famous Night Glows taking place on the Thursday and Saturday evenings and its mass ascents happening daily, subject to the weather. Bristol balloon fiesta is celebrating its 40th anniversary in 2018 and is marking the occasion in style with a ... Read more

Istabul, Turkey Turkey’s currency, lira has reached an all-time low against the pound, stimulating a rush in inbound tourists from UK. Lira reached 0.15 against pound sterling, resulted from a continuous decline during the past twelve months. The decrease in value during this period is around 35 per cent. Anyone changing 100 pound would get more than 650 lira. As per Thomas Cook’s recent reports, there has been an increase of around 63 per cent in bookings to Turkey during 2018, when compared to 2017. Antalya airport in Turkey excelled Spain’s Palma de Mallorca as the company’s most served airport ... Read more

Mini-Europe is hosting a sound and light show for three Saturdays from Aug. 4 to 18 to mark the 2018 China-European Union Tourism Year campaign. It was as per the decision taken jointly in the China-EU Summit in July 2016 to observe 2018 as China-EU Tourism Year. The night sky in Brussels was lit up with dazzling colours, as Chinese themed fireworks shot up from its landmark Mini-Europe park as part of the celebrations. The park has been adorned with Chinese lanterns bearing images from Sichuan Opera, a traditional opera that originated in China’s southwestern Sichuan Province, famous for its ... Read more

Barcelo Resorts (Photo Courtesy: Bookings.com) Spanish hotels are cutting prices on summer holiday packages as tourists return to destinations like Turkey and resorts in North Africa, while visitor numbers to Spain continue to be increasing for the past four years. Tourism is one of major revenue earner of Spain, accounting for around 11 per cent of Spain’s total revenue. Last year around 82 million tourists visited Spain, making it the world’s second most visited country after France. Spain’s hotels have exploited the country’s popularity as a sought after tourist destination and increased prices on average by 21.4 per cent over ... Read more

European countries are experiencing a surge in inbound tourists from China during the first half of the year. The main reasons for this trend is said to be the changing tastes of Chinese tourists – from shopping to art and culture. Moreover, the cold reception from Trump’s America also considered a factor for Chinese tourists to opt for European countries. Recent surveys states, Chinese tourists are avoiding package tours to Europe to strike out on their own trips to unexplored locations, than the popular names in the tourism map. Bookings for the month of July and August in Europe are ... Read more

The Roman Amphitheatre in Plovdiv Bulgaria has two major tourist destinations, which add to the tourism potential of the country – Plovdiv and Varna. Plovdiv, Bulgaria’s second-largest city, has got the European Capitals of Culture award for the year 2019, sharing with Matera, Italy whereas Varna is the maritime capital of Bulgaria. Plodiv is one among the oldest continually inhabited cities in Europe, established around the 6th century BC and a tourist destination, which is in its growth path. Currently it is a modern and vibrant city, which serves as the administrative, academic, economic, commercial and transportation centre of the south-central ... Read more

The political leaders of Maldives, who are close to the President, may get travel bans and asset freeze, as per the Foreign Affairs Council of the European Union. In a statement the EU said those who are responsible for undermining the rule of law or obstructing and inclusive political solution in the Maldives as well as persons and entities responsible for human rights violations will get the sanctions. Earlier India has urged for restoration of democracy in Maldives. It was feared, if the Abdulla Yameen government go like this, in the forthcoming election, he would be the sole candidate for ... Read more

Britons become the top tourists who have visited Ireland, revealed a recent research, which states that one in four of the island’s foreign visitors are from the UK. It was in the third Annual Tourism Index, Europcar, Ireland revealed that 27 per cent of foreign tourists who visited Ireland last year came from UK. Americans stands second with 13 per cent. Italians bag the third place with 12 per cent of the foreign foot prints. Researchers tried to find out the reason that attracts people to Ireland and it was understood from the survey that majority of the tourists were ... Read more