Tourism representatives to discuss future of sector

ANTALYA

DHA Photo

Turkish and foreign tourism representatives, banking executives, journalists and academics met yesterday to discuss future tourism trends at the International Resort Tourism Congress and the conference will continue today.

Leading representatives will discuss the latest touristic developments in the Mediterranean region, cruise ship tourism and the future of the online travel market in a series of sessions organized by Resort magazine, co-published by the Mediterranean Touristic Hoteliers Association (AKTOB) and the Ekin Group.

Peter Fankhasuser of Thomas Cook, a leading global leisure travel group, Jurgen Stille of Norwegian Cruise, Denizbank CEO Hakan Ateş, Turkish journalist Güngör Uras, digital marketing strategist Marco Ryan and FVW Editor Klaus Hildebrandt are expected to attend the sessions with many other leading sector professionals.

The latest AKTOB report is expected to fuel many of the talks during the two-day event.

Some 65 percent of tourism facilities on Turkey’s coasts need to be renovated in order to compete with other facilities around the Mediterranean, even though nearly half of Turkey’s hotels are less than 10 years old, according to a recent report by the AKTOB.

Over 44 percent of hotels are under 10 years old in Turkey, giving it some of the youngest hotels in the Mediterranean region.
Around 41 percent of hotels are less than 10 years old in Spain, while this figure is 21 percent in Portugal, 19 percent in Italy, 18 percent in Greece and 8 percent in Germany.