The Egyptian tourism sector has succeeded in overcoming many challenges and crushing crises that it has faced over the past years, explained by the indicators and figures confirming a significant increase in the incoming tourism movement to Egypt during the past months.

These successes came as a result of ambitious strategies and quick measures to create an investment climate and stimulate the private sector to participate in the development and launch of the tourism industry. However, despite these efforts, there are still some challenges facing Egypt in restoring its true position on the global tourism map.

In this context, Canada Egypt Business Council and the Egyptian Business Council for International Cooperation held a symposium entitled “The Future of Tourism in Egypt ..Opportunities and Challenges” featuring H.E. Dr. Ahmed Issa ;Minister of Tourism& Antiquities

In his opening remarks, Mr. Motaz Raslan chairman of CEBC and ECIC mentioned that he tourism sector faced many enormous challenges and grinding crises for many years, which were behind Egypt leaving its seat in the first ranks of the most prominent tourist destinations in the world.. Starting from 2011 until our time, the sector faced difficult circumstances and continuous events that affected growth rates and revenues, starting with the January revolution and then a disaster The crash of the Russian plane at the end of October 2015, and as soon as the signs of recovery began to return to the tourism movement in 2019, the Corona crisis came, making the sector live its worst condition, then the Russian-Ukrainian war and its repercussions surprised us from high inflation and energy prices and the disruption of supply chains, which affected most of the economies of the world, As if all circumstances met to stand in front of the launch of the tourism train, the strongest source of national income.

Then Mr. Raslan went on explaining that all indicators and reports indicate that the difficult stage exceeded and the stage of reaping the fruits began, after revenues decreased to 66%, or 4.4 billion in 2020, to a target of 14 billion dollars this year, and last April achieved the highest rate in the movement of tourism coming in the history of Egyptian tourism by about one million And 350 thousand tourists, and there is an increase of 37% in the incoming tourism movement during the first quarter of this year, and there are strong expectations that Egypt will receive 15 million tourists this year numbers that call for pride and confirm that we are going on the right path and placing Egypt in the position it deserves on the tourism map Globalism.

He added “I don’t see that Egypt is taking what it deserves of its share of the global tourism movement, and its share did not exceed 1%, according to some international reports, and this of course does not fit with our capabilities and tourism components, and I see that there are some local and global challenges beyond the control that are still facing this file and that must be solved soon. In this context, we are pleased to host His Excellency Minister Ahmed Issa, Minister of Tourism and Antiquities… We thank him for accepting the invitation and participating in the dialogue about the future of tourism in Egypt.”

Then the floor was given to H.E. Dr. Ahmed Issa ;Minister of Tourism& Antiquities as he stressed on the importance of the tourism industry for the economies of countries, especially as it’s one of the most important foreign currency sources, and its significant impact on many other industries.

The minister pointed out that during the first six months of this year, the incoming movement for the first time in the history of tourism in Egypt witnessed a growth in the number of tourists, which exceeded 7 million tourists, with an increase also in the number of tourist nights, as well as the regularity and diversity of the sources of tourism markets exporting this movement in combination. Distinguished for the first time without much focus for one nationality over the other nationalities.

The minister was keen to congratulate the private sector on these results, as it has an important and major role in achieving them, pointing out that the ministry’s current goal is to achieve rapid growth ranging between 25%-30% annually, which is led by the private sector, and that this is within the framework of regulation and governance. Which contributes to preserving the interests of the tourist visitor and receives the distinguished tourism experience he deserves.

He also talked about the most important strategic axes currently being worked on, which came to improve the supply side of the Egyptian tourist destination, which is to allow greater access to the Egyptian tourist destination and to double the number of airline seats coming to Egypt in cooperation with the Ministry of Civil Aviation to push more incoming tourist traffic to Egypt, and the axis of improving the investment climate. Tourism in Egypt and increasing the number of hotel rooms in it during the coming period, as well as the axis of developing the tourist experience by developing the quality of services provided to them in different tourist destinations, which will be worked on through a short-term and long-term plans that will contribute to the development of the tourism product to suit all tourists.

He concluded his speech stressing on the importance of cooperation between the private investors and Ministry of Housing, Utilities and Urban Communities to put a master plan to achieve optimal utilization of the touristic areas and to support these areas with various types of service and entertainment activities.

Then the floor was opened for questions and answers where many inquiries and ideas were discussed by a lot of  guests that were attending the seminar.