Getting tourism back on track in the UAE
With all the efforts by the leadership of the United Arab Emirates, last month the country opened for international travellers amidst strict protocols to ensure the safety and security of every individual. In the first session of the second Travtalk ME conclave, three eminent personalities spoke about the tourism industry and its future. Ready for next phase
HE Khalid Jassim Al Midfa, Chairman, Sharjah Commerce and Tourism Development Authority, said, “After going through the different stages and experiments I believe that life can come back to normal much before we expect. In other countries people with symptoms had to visit a doctor for check-up but here the approach was different, the government tested over 50 per cent of the population so that the citizens, people and the visitors are safe. We are seeing the airlines opening up slowly, and we are slowly building confidence and trust due to these efforts over the past few months. In Phase 2 of this scenario which will start early September we will start seeing more people coming into the UAE and having a higher level of comfort and trust in what the UAE
has to offer. I believe that the future will be bright and from what we are seeing from all emirates, with the guidelines of the leadership we are prepared for the next stage.”
In 2019, we received 7.3 million guests both hotel and MICE guests to Sharjah, the aim was to attract 10 million by 2021, it will be extended to 2022 and we should achieve it
Sharjah hits
7.3 million visitors in 2019
As the set goal of 10 million visitors by 2021 approaches, the pandemic has but a short-term impact on the visitor arrivals and the UAE was one of the leading countries in the world to open to tourism once again. HE Midfa shared, “In 2019, we received 7.3 million guests both hotel and MICE guests to Sharjah, the aim was to attract 10 million by 2021, it will be extended to 2022 and we should achieve it. You can see the numbers flowing into the UAE due to our strong infrastructure and road networks, which have a competitive advantage. In terms of receiving business and tourists to the UAE across the seven different emirates, the road networks and public transport infrastructure is here for the new normal base. I’m very optimistic the near future will be very bright. We will see things slowly coming back.”
Confidence building
“I think we should make sure that we convey the right message, sometimes I have seen some companies going back to the traditional marketing focusing on mixed messages. I think today it is very important looking at the present situation and the demand of the visitors and the people, we should convey the message that gives confidence to the visitors, always keep that as your main message. You have done a lot of hard work and effort in that regard, so why not convey that message to your visitors, we as government entities as well as private companies or establishments need to always focus on this area to make sure it is given in the proper way to give enough information for the visitors to the UAE. For the time being, for the coming six months this would be the winning area when it comes to marketing,” added HE Midfa.
travellers. So quality reassurance is fairly strong in the Middle East, the way forward in the short-term is to develop these bubbles to see how we can get people from key markets in and then to see a very aggressive, very focused and localised targeted marketing programme to connect the markets that are opened up as we go,” stated Billa.
Reprioritise your product portfolio
Billa pointed out, “The immediate bubble is going to be within the region but as you go forward as some of the European countries are opening it will be easier for the Middle East to plug into that and if you look at India they are looking at UAE.” He further explained what the “bubble does”, when somebody comes from a destination there are certain quarantine elements; they need to be sure that they conform to the safety and hygiene standards as the destination wants to protect their citizens from being exposed to risk or getting infected. So, safety comes first. Second is what the hotels will do in all industry touch points. In terms of markets they will be staggered as they open up.
You don’t have the luxury of pitching your products to the entire world; it has to be very localised, very specific. If Germany is opening up, you need to see what are the products that would be of interest to the German market. Reprioritise your product portfolio and match it with the market you are going to focus on and run a very hyper focus campaign.
MENA region has been very robust, their global share is 6 per cent and by 2030 we expect it would move up to 8 per cent. There is nothing to suggest that the robustness of growth and development in this region is going to slow down