Kyrgyzstan gaining popularity as tourism destination: Kyrgyz Tourism Minister
Mr Maksat Damir uulu, Deputy Minister of Culture, Information and Tourism, Kyrgyz Republic, today said that Kyrgyzstan is gaining popularity among foreign tourists and India offers a huge market of outbound tourists for the mountainous country in Central Asia.
Speaking at an interaction between travel companies of the two countries, organised by FICCI, Mr Damir uulu said, “We are making dramatic growth in terms of visitors. We had 4.5 million visitors in Kyrgystan in 2017, it became 7 million in 2018 and 8.5 million in 2019. Kyrgystan is becoming more popular destination in the world.”
Hosting the roadshow to facilitate collaboration with Indian travel companies, he said, “India is the number three country in the world for outbound tourism after China and the US. India is a huge market and like every other country we too are trying to get a small piece of the cake.”
Mr Damir uulu made a presentation on the tourism potential of the Kyrgyz Republic sharing the marketing strategy revolving around eco and recreation tourism in the summers and winter tourism. It was followed by B2B negotiations between the representatives of the tourism industry from both countries.
The number of Indian tourists visiting Kyrgyzstan has shot up from 3,204 in 2015 to 25,947 in 2018, followed by 20,066 in 2019. The Kyrgyz government is working to ease the process of visa requirement and others to attract more tourists, he said.
Mr Asein Isaev, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Kyrgyz Republic to India, said, “Treat the embassy as your partner. Our embassy is open for you 24 hours a day. Be our partner to bring Kyrgyzstan closer to Indian citizens.
Mr Rajan Sehgal, Member, FICCI Tourism Committee, Managing Committee Member, Travel Agents Association of India (TAAI), and President, Indian Golf Tourism Association (IGTA), said the leader of the two countries have shown great commitment towards improving the relationship to the next level of inclusive growth and development.
“Our Prime Minister made a historic visit in June 2019 to your beautiful country and created path-breaking opportunities between the two countries, setting course for next steps towards smooth trade and investment linkages.
“We are committed to create avenues of opportunity with Kyrgyz Republic to benefit our peoples in sectors focussed on mutual trade and investment,” Mr Sehgal said.
While Mr Amit Aggarwal, Bollywood producer, talked about his experience about shooting a movie in Kyrgyzstan, Mr Srman Jain, Bollywood actor, spoke on how he felt in the country while doing 18 music videos there. Both were of the view that Kyrgyzstan offers a great opportunity for shooting films that stand out different from others even on a low budget.