The Department-related Parliamentary Standing Committee on Transport, Tourism and Culture recently presented a report titled ‘Role of Indian Missions Globally for the growth of Tourism in India’ in the Rajya Sabha, where it mentioned that Ministry of Home Affairs is developing e-VISA mobile application, which can be expedited. 

New Zealand’s border fully reopens from August 1. To highlight details on what to expect while travelling to the country, TNZ’s webinar today at 11 am which will also be attended by key govt agencies such as NZ Customs Service & Biosecurity New Zealand. Write to jaspreet.kaur@ddppl.com or 9650196532 to register. 

With the tourist sector recovering following lifting of COVID-19 restrictions by many countries, Oman recorded 794,000 inbound travellers till the end of the end of May 2022. As many as 111,883 Indian travelers visited Oman till the end of May 2022 as compared to 24,881 recorded in April this year. According to the tourism indicators for May 2022 released by National Centre for Statistics and Information (NCSI), while 1.5 million travelers departed Oman by the end of May 2022, the nation received 794,000 travellers from GCC nations, India, Yemen, Germany, and United Kingdom by the end of May 2022.  The top five nationalities arriving into Oman out of the total inbound included GCC nations, India, Yemen, Pakistan and Germany and the number of travelers recorded were 349,986; 111,883; 28,495; 23,603, and 23,289, respectively. As many as 216,000 visitors arrived in Oman in the month of May 2022 alone as compared 6,036 in May 2021. The total number of inbound visitors increased by over 35 times as compared to the inbound visitors in May 2021.  The number of Omanis departing the country during the month of May 2022 was registered at 184,000 compared to 135, 969 recorded in the same month of the previous year. Many travelers could not leave Oman following strict COVID-19 restrictions.  While this was so, the percentage of Gulf visitors increased by 54.5 per cent out of the total inbound visitors during May 2022. As many as 216,000 visitors arrived in Oman during the month of May 2022 as against 6,036 in May 2021.  Meanwhile, according to the survey, three to five-star hotels generated a revenue of OMR 73 million from 3-5 star hotels by the end …

To satisfy the current and projected rise in demand for commercial air travel, Indian airlines have placed large orders for aircraft. The nation’s airplane fleet is projected to quadruple in size to approximately 2500 airplanes by 2038 and India to become the third largest aviation market in the world by 2024. 

Travel Agents Federation of India’s eastern region chairman Anil Punjabi said with a lot of bookings and enquiries from people from various countries and Indian states, tourist arrivals to Kolkata and other parts of the state will be at an “all-time high” this time during Durga Puja. 

Continuing with its series of exclusive webinars to help the travel trade discover Spain, the Tourism Office of Spain – Mumbai, along with Andalucia Tourism, will conduct an exclusive one-hour webinar titled ‘Self Drive in Andalucia’ on Saturday, July 23 at 3 pm IST. Sign up today for the Spain Specialist Program (SSP) and register now to attend the webinar. The webinar will conclude with an exciting quiz on the destination and the winner will leave with a 7-day trip to Andalucia in November 2022. For more information, write to jaspreet.kaur@ddppl.com or 9650196532.

Goa government has come up with a concept of co-working spaces on the beaches. The state is going to promote the “culture of #WorkationGoa” through co-working spaces to be created on the beaches, said Tourism and Information and Technology (IT) Minister Rohan Khaunte.  

Rajiv Mehra, President, IATO, has said that after the cancellation of their convention in Bengaluru, Karnataka, they are now looking at Rajasthan for organising the 37th IATO Convention in December 2022.

All taxis in Goa must come on a single app so that tourists get a better experience, state tourism minister Rohan Khaunte. “We need to protect the business of existing taxi operators and also adopt technology. That is why I support the concept of getting all taxis in Goa on a common app. The state government and the sector must design a common app for the tourist taxi service,” he said. 

According to the latest poll of GBTA members, business travel is projected to reach pre-COVID 19 levels of US $1.4 trillion in revenue by 2024, business travel bookings are seeing an increase rebound month on month. However, travel managers cite staffing shortages and government policies and restrictions as having a significant impact on corporate travel programs.