Tourism Breaking News
The Mauritius Tourism Promotion Authority (MTPA) is currently on a five-city roadshow that started from Mumbai on Aug 22 and reached Ahmedabad on Aug 23. The delegation will then travel to New Delhi on August 25, Bengaluru on August 26 and finally concluding in Chennai on August 27. Leading a 30-member delegation from Mauritius was Kevin Ramakaloan, Director, Mauritius Tourism Promotion Authority. Mumbai saw attendance from more than 170 agents and tour operators and about 15 wedding planners from India to meet the international sellers.
Ramkaloan said, “The Indian market is extremely important for Mauritius. We have over the years seen an increase in the tourist numbers from India. But recently, as of last year, we have seen a 20 per cent increase, we hope to reach the 100,000 mark by 2017 with the help of MPTA India. Apart from honeymooners, we are targeting the MICE segment as well as cruise tourism. We currently see around 5,000 arrivals for MICE from India so we can easily double and even treble this number.”
He added, “In 2015 Mauritius we had growth from 2014-15 of more than 11 per cent in the number of tourist arrivals. And close to eight to nine per cent in terms of tourist earnings. This year we would like to continue this growth and hence from 1.15 million tourists overall coming to Mauritius grew to 1.2 million. India represents 72,000 tourists per year. Last year we did a 20 per cent increase which brought us to 72,000 tourists from India. For the half from January to July this year, we did 12 per cent increase. Just in July we saw 43 per cent increase in arrivals. By 2017 we should hit the 100,000 mark for Indian arrivals.”
