Remarkable growth in Saudi domestic tourism trips

The SCTA anticipated that domestic tourism will witness a remarkable growth of about 15% during the summer of 2008.

The SCTA anticipated that domestic tourism will witness a remarkable growth of about 15% during the summer of 2008. A statistical report issued by MAS Center revealed that it is expected that the number of tourism domestic trips from July until September in 2008 will reach 11 million trips comparing with 9.6 million trips in 2007.

MAS Center anticipated the length of stay will be 86.4 million nights comparing with 72 million nights during the same period last year. The number this year reflects a growth of 19.5% in the length of stay. This period forms 38% of the total expected nights during 2008 assuming that the average length of stay for a domestic tourist will remain steady โ€“ about 9 nights.

The initial data issued by MAS Center indicates that the domestic tourism expenditures during the summer of 2008 are about SR 10.6 billion comparing with expenditures of 2007 reaching SR 9.3 billion.

MAS Center predicted that the most important domestic tourism trips are: Makkah Province with 43%, Maddinah Province with 15%, Aseer Province 14%, Riyadh 10%, and Easter Province 8%.

MAS Center anticipated that the purposes for domestic tourism trips are leisure and entertainment (50%), followed by religious purpose (24.5%), visiting friends and relatives (21.5%) and for MICE purpose (2.8%).

Dr. Mohammad Al-Ahmed, the general manager of MAS Center, stressed that establishing the tourism concept and raising the tourism awareness of KSA’s tourism potentials helped positively in the tourism movement growth.

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Linda Hohnholz

Editor in chief for eTurboNews based in the eTN HQ.

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