By: Moustafa Adel
Mubasher: Qatar’s tourism sector has achieved a 0.4% year-on-year growth during the second quarter of 2018.
Tourism revenues recorded QAR 5.38 billion ($1.5 billion) in Q2-18, compared to QAR 5.36 billion ($1.48 billion) in Q2-17, according to recent data released by the Qatar Central Bank (QCB).
For the first half of 2018, tourism revenues of the Persian Gulf country amounted to QAR 10.6 billion ($2.9 billion).
Qatar’s tourism sector has been negatively affected by the first anniversary of the gas-rich nation’s diplomatic crisis with four Arab countries led by Saudi Arabia, as the number of GCC visitors witnessed a drop.
Since 5 June 2017, Qatar has been facing outflows of foreign customers' deposits after four Arab countries - Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain, and Egypt - cut their diplomatic and trade ties with the gas-rich state, accusing Qatar of financing terrorism. Doha forcefully denies the charges.
As for the first eight months of this year, the number of travellers who visited Qatar declined 28% year-on-year to 1.2 million, from 1.69 million in the same period of the previous year.
The number of Qatar’s arrivals from Gulf nations decreased by 79% during the period between January and August.
On the other hand, Qatari tourists’ spending plunged 8% to QAR 8.12 billion ($2.25 billion) in Q2-18, against QAR 8.85 billion ($2.45 billion) in the same period the year before.
It is worth noting that Qatar has a five-year tourist strategy 2017-2023 that attracted around 5.6 million visitors by 2023, in addition to increasing the contribution of tourism to the gross domestic product (GDP) to QAR 41.3 billion by 2023.
Translated by: Kholoud Mohamed Hussein
