Do you remember that after the events of March 1 former president Robert Kocharyan told people that it would affect the incoming tourism and even some tour packages had already been cancelled?
The former president’s announcements were followed by Trade and Economic Development minister Nerses Yeritsyan’s warnings that the films and information about the political crisis in Armenia posted in the internet by the loyalists of first president Levon Ter-Petrosyan had frightened tourists. Certainly Mr. Yeritsyan did not specify how they had seen that the tourists were frightened by those films specifically but not the broadcast of the H1 national TV channel and the state of emergency. However, the important thing is the fact that tourism suffered. According to the official statistics, during January-September of 2008 over 402.223 tourists visited Armenia in case when the number of the tourists visiting Armenia in 2007 was about 370.731. The number of tourists grew by 8.5%. For comparison, the growth of tourists’ inflow last year was 33.8%. Most of the tourists visiting Armenia (345.5 thousand) preferred to stay with their relatives, rent apartments or other lodgings. About 56,654 tourists stayed at hotels. The number of people who reserve hotels in Armenia is growing faster than those who stay with their relatives (25/5,8%). The demography of the tourists visiting Armenia is very interesting too. The biggest group of tourists are the tourists visiting Armenia from the United States (21,8%). The next two biggest groups of tourists visiting Armenia are from Russia (17,1%) and France (12,2%). The capacity of tourists visiting Armenia from the CIS countries is 23.1%, and from the Euro Union countries – 37.9%.
As for the activation tendencies of tourist inflows to Armenia according to specific countries, during the past 9 months of this year the number of tourists visiting Armenia from Georgia grew by 62.1%, and from Iran – by 51.9%. As a matter of fact, the biggest activation percentage concerns the tourists from Turkey, thus the number of tourists visiting Armenia from Turkey grew by 85.5%.
It is also very interesting to see what is the purpose of such visits (the information concerns only the tourists registered with hotel desks). 20,739 tourists out of 56,654 (or 36.6%) visited Armenia for business purposes, 16.4% – for entertainment purposes, 0.3% – to get medical treatment and 46.6% – for other purposes.
In fact, even the official statistics shows that there is slowdown in tourism development. The authorities may now claim that they were warning us that such things would happen. However, no one can say whether the tourists were afraid of the films posted at youtube or the satellite broadcast of the H1 national TV. On the other hand, no one can say whether the tourists were frightened or they just lost their interest to our country. Even if they are afraid of visiting Armenia, maybe they are not afraid of the results of the March 1 events but the high prices of hotels, which are now higher as a result of dollar depreciation. By the way, in the recent period the exchange rate has been stabile and the price of one dollar is ranging between 305 and 310 drams. We wander whether there is any optimism that due to the fact that the opposition has suspended the rallies and demonstrations the government may make Jermuk a good resort center and activate tourism there. Certainly people may hope, and the government may assure that our country will become a center for tourism.
If tourists don’t visit Armenia due to the world crisis, the government officials will make calculations and easily substantiate and explain to people that as a result of the world crisis people don’t have enough money to visit Armenia.
Furthermore, we wander what tourists will think if they read the open letter of Hans Boon, the director of Haypost company. When reading this open letter it seems that Armenia is a country of man-eaters. It is natural that if the potential tourists from Holland read this letter certainly they will change their mind and will not visit Armenia. Also, we wander what the impression of the international community will be if they know that 3 citizens of Armenia have won court trials with the European court and the government shall compensate them for policemen’s rough behavior. Certainly facts such as the killing at Odnoklassniki cafe and the attack on the editor of Hetq news agency Edik Baghdasaryan are discrediting Armenia. The impact of such facts on Armenia is more than the impact of the international crisis, but no one is thinking of this and there are no calculations and attempts to prevent it.