Visa should not be barrier to tourism - de Marco

Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi agrees that something needs to be done to reduce the bureaucracy in the issuing of visas while giving consideration to the security aspect.

Dr Gonzi, who was addressing the European Tourism Forum, spoke after European Commissioner vice-president Antonio Tajani, who is responsible for industry and entrepreneurship, gave a keynote address in which he referred to a proposal he had made for a visa to be issued to just the leader and a group and not to all members, so as to cut down on bureaucracy and red tape, while facilitating tourism.

“In the face of competition we have to change our way of doing things.

“We have to do something about the visa especially for the Chinese and Russian market but also for other countries,” Mr Tajani said.

Dr Gonzi agreed that it was useless investing millions in the product if one could not provide the key for tourists to travel.

Tourism Parliamentary Secretary Mario de Marco said that should never be a barrier to tourism.

Commissioner Tajani said that Europe had to diversify the European tourism product.

A quality European tourism brand had to be developed, especially to attract people from emerging markets, such as China and Russia.

He said that arrivals to European destinations from Brazil last year increased by 46 per cent, from China by 19 per cent and from Russia by 18 per cent.

The Asian market made up 38 per cent of total arrivals and this figure was expected to increase to 47 per cent by 2020.

Europe, the Commissioner said, needed to tackle the seasonality problem and offer tourists longer holidays.

It needed to take advantage of events such as London Olympics in 2012 and the Expo in Milan in 2015, as these would help attract more people.

Dr Gonzi said that for success in tourism, a country, including Malta, also had to be successful in other areas, such as the environment, waste management, recycling, energy, electricity, and security.

Moreover, education also had a pivotal role to play in the tourism industry. For how could one possibly provide a good service without education, he asked.

Dr Gonzi said that seasonality was an issue that Europe had to address because the continent could not afford to have fully booked hotels in summer but fewer bookings in winter.

“We should tap into niche markets such as religious, cultural and sports,” he said.

The Prime Minister said that Europe should be at the foremost of the industry because what was available in Europe could not be found anywhere else.

He noted that the first indications of positive results after the recession, which had dampened everybody, were being felt and tourism could play an important role in getting the economy growth back on right track.

2010, Dr Gonzi said, was going to be a record year for Malta and the logic behind this was transforming challenges into opportunities to stimulate investment.

Dr de Marco said that Europe had been longing for an action plan for tourism for a long time.

The financial crisis showed how resilient and flexible the industry was and at a time of crisis, Malta shifted its focus on short haul and managed to increase Italian tourism by 30 per cent and tripled the number of tourists coming from Spain.

He said that European countries should work together to tap tourism from Brazil, India, China and the Russian markets, instead of in competition with one another.