Expo 2020 Dubai
ABU DHABI, 14th September, 2021 The UAE is preparing to be the world’s leading destination for travellers over the next six months during the Expo 2020 Dubai, while the local hotel sector has regained its prepandemic reservation rates. The General Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) revealed the total number of passengers travelling to the UAE grew in August 2021 to over 2.5 million, compared to 814,000 in the same period of 2020, surging by 207 percent. In its statement to the Emirates News Agency (WAM), the GCAA highlighted increased figures in national air traffic statistics for August, which recorded 45,953 flights. The preventive measures to contain the coronavirus pandemic are one of the significant factors that helped boost the country's stature as a safe travel destination, despite the pandemic continuing globally. The UAE leads the list of countries in terms of vaccine distribution rate, with 79.3 percent of population being fully vaccinated until 13th September, with the number of coronavirus tests conducted being 78,651,247. The percentage of those received the first dose is 90.5. Tourism experts and specialists predict the coming period to be a real breakthrough for the tourism sector after it recently regained its balance following a series of critical decisions made by the UAE Government, most notably allowing fully vaccinated individuals to apply for an entry visa. In 16 days, the UAE will witness the grand start of the Expo 2020 Dubai, one of the world’s most anticipated events and will make the country the top tourist destination over the next six months. The expo is expected to receive over 25 million local and foreign visitors. It will also play a key role in advancing the tourism sector and positively affect many other sectors, including aviation and transport. In general, hotel reservations in the UAE already witnessed significant growth prior to the Expo 2020 Dubai. The hotel booking website, "Wego" registered over 500,000 searches for flights and hotel reservations for Dubai during the event period.