Tourist arrivals up by 12%: Govt (Herald)

Tourist arrivals up by 12%: Govt January 23, 2014 TEAM HERALD PANJIM: The State has for the first time hosted more than three million tourists in a single calendar year, the Goa Tourism Department has claimed, adding that the sector has witnessed a 12% growth from last year till now. Announcing official figures, Tourism Minister Dilip Parulekar credited the rise in tourism growth to his department’s “aggressive marketing and PR campaigns, introduction of safety measures and focus on alternative tourism and hinterland culture.” The figures were gleaned off tourist establishments, the foreigner registration services and other sources, he said. “The figures indicate that domestic tourist arrivals have climbed up by 12.47% in 2013 and international tourist arrivals are up by 9.27%. The overall tourist growth is around 12% which is a record high for the State,” Parulekar said reading out from a prepared statement. According to statistics released by the department, Russians continued to be the single largest contributor to Goa Tourism for the third year running with 1.62 lakh Russians arriving in the State (or 10% of the State’s population) between January and December followed by British tourists of whom 1.45 lakh arrived during the same period. People of other nationalities including Germans, Scandinavians, and other Europeans arrivals were below 50,000 each. Parulekar now said that given the trend, his department is “geared up to build world class tourist infrastructure” which he hopes will fuel growth further. The Tourism department has also launched an Android (TM) app for the benefit of tourists called “goa” that will help tourists with information about demography, travel, must see places, events, dos and donts etc. The developers announced that the app will be soon made available in various languages including Hindi, Russian and German over the next few months. No discrimination between nationalities: Parulekar PANJIM: When questioned about the quality of tourists the State is receiving, Tourism Minister Dilip Parulekar said that in the spirit of “Atithi Devo Bhava” (guest is God) the state Tourism department does not discriminate between “black or white, rich or poor English or Russian” when it comes to its acceptance of tourists and is willing to cater to a wide range of nationalities and cultures of tourists that come into the State. http://www.one.in/oheraldo/tourist-arrivals-up-by-12govt-1108964.html