Tourism officials unfazed by UL pullout from key Europe routes

By Charumini de Silva

The country’s tourism authority yesterday played down the negative impacts of SriLankan Airlines pulling out from two major destinations from Europe asserting that Sri Lanka could attract 2.5 million visitors by the end of the year banking on the positive trends of charter flights as well as new airlines resuming operations to the island.

“We hope to attract 2.5 million tourists by the end of the year as the indications are very good. Bookings are encouraging, travel and tour agents are confident, hoteliers are optimistic of high occupancy rates from September onwards,” Tourism Development, Lands and Christian Religious Affairs Minister John Amaratunga told the media yesterday.

He said regardless of the national carrier, SriLankan Airlines, pulling out from direct flights to Paris and Frankfurt by the end of the year, the country would still be able to meet its target as Charter flights are gradually picking up business in collaboration with hotels.

“This matter was discussed in-depth at the Prime Minister’s office and we came to the conclusion that by October SriLankan Airlines would have to wind-up certain destinations to Europe. This could be temporally. After the airline picks up it will be able to resume those destinations again,” Minister stated confidently.

Sri Lanka Tourism Promotion Bureau and Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority Chairman, Paddy Withana, admitting there is an impact from SriLankan Airlines pulling out, asserted that it could be still covered with connecting flight frequencies from Middle East to Sri Lanka which are improving and with new operators that handle direct flights, such as KLM and Austrian Airlines, coming into action.

Rs. 800 m tourism promotion to start from September

Tourism officials yesterday revealed that crucial country promotion to the tune of Rs. 800 million will begin from September this year.

Sri Lanka Tourism Promotion Bureau Chairman Paddy Vithana said Rs.800 million will be invested in four different types of campaigns which are more digital based to cut across all possible markets to enhance the industry.

He gave the breakdown of the four major campaigns as: global advertising Rs.300 million, global online digital marketing Rs.200 million, global PR Rs.200 and content development Rs.100 million. However the return on investment (RoI) has not been analysed as yet.

“By September we could be able launch one campaign and all of these will be called open tender procedure. All these four projects are in the due diligence process at present. We are also focused on hiring global PR companies for China and Russia, which are considered as key markets for us, but they are still in the pipeline,” he explained.

Justifying the delay in starting these four projects, Minister Amaratunga said it was due to heavy corruption which took place during the previous regime and assured that present officials at the authority are very carefully attending to this in a transparent manner.