The cruise season in Qatar has concluded with great success as record number of travellers came to the country during 2018-19 season. Doha Port received 144,707 passengers and crew on 44 ships during the season according to Mwani Qatar.
Cruise season runs from September to April in Qatar. A total of 65,675 visitors arrived on Qatar’s shores during 2017/18 season, which was a 39 percent increase compared to the previous season.
The record breaking number of tourist arrival has confirmed Doha Port’s important role in boosting marine tourism revenues and transforming Qatar into a regional cruise hub.
The rise in number tourists was a result of main line cruise vessels expressing their interest in Doha and deploying bigger cruise vessels to Doha.
According to Qatar National Tourism Council, Qatar received 588,000 visitors during the first quarter of this year, an increase of 10 percent compared to the Q1 last year.
Qatar’s stop-over program has brought 100,000 visitors while Qatar Airways has brought close to 200,000 visitors to the country.
The increase in number of travellers in the country shows that Qatar has emerged as a favourite destination for global tourist. Qatar has identified tourism as one of five priority sectors for achieving economic diversification and several steps were taken to increase tourist inflow in the country.
Among the most important developments was the Emiri decree to establish Qatar National Tourism Council (QNTC). The council took significant efforts in diversifying visitor source markets and promoting Qatar as an attractive tourism destination.
In 2018, six representative offices were opened in three of the world’s largest visitor source markets - China, India and Russia. In November 2018, QNTC had launched Qatar’s first global destination campaign. The year 2018 also witnessed the launch of the Al Enna project which covers an area of 6 million metre square in Sealine and Khor AlAdaid and aims to enhance the visitor’s coastal and desert experience.
The Al Enna project is an initial phase of a comprehensive plan to develop the region over a five-year period. The plan entails the development of roads, beaches, camp infrastructure and the region in general.
With all these measures taken in the past, the number of tourists heading to Qatar will only increase further. The continued growth in Qatar’s tourism sector confirm that the proactive steps taken by the authorities are yielding results.
