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Jordan to celebrate World Tourism Day with cultural walk exploring Amman

By Ana V. Ibáñez Prieto - Oct 04,2018 - Last updated at Oct 04,2018

AMMAN — The Jordan Inbound Tour Operators Association (JITOA) on October 13 will commemorate World Tourism Day (WTD) 2018 with “Walk Through Time”, a cultural walk for the tourism, sector and its partners which will take participants from the old Jabal Luweibdeh to the modern Abdali district. 

Held under the patronage of Tourism Minister Lina Annab, the celebratory walk will engage tourism sector employees and residents of Amman in order to highlight the walking route and boost its exposure to international travellers, the organisers said during a press conference held on Wednesday. 

The new walking route will link modern and traditional parts of the Kingdom’s capital, starting from the emblematic Paris Circle and continuing through Baooniyeh and Sharia streets and the Jordan National Gallery of Fine Arts. Participants will pass old churches and the King Abdullah Mosque, and continue past the Courts of Justice and Parliament.

The walk will finish in Abdali with an official ceremony held at the Boulevard, where participants will have the chance to meet several representatives from the tourism sector and enjoy activities such as food stalls, raffles and crafts for children. 

In addition, the walk will feature the opening of the Tourism Experiences Marketplace — a designated area with 12 spots for different tourism operators to showcase a variety of experiences and digital platforms involving local communities across the Kingdom. 

A new WTD committee was formed in order to implement the initiative, which included entities such as the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities, the Jordan Tourism Board and the Greater Amman Municipality among others. 

Celebrated every September 27 around the world, this year’s edition of the WTD is being celebrated by the United Nations World Tourism Organisation under the theme of “tourism and the digital transformation”.

“We know that a digitally advanced tourism sector can improve entrepreneurship, inclusion, local community empowerment and efficient resource management, amongst other important development objectives,” the UN agency said in a press statement, adding that “this year’s WTD will help us to further explore the opportunities provided to tourism by technological advances including big data, artificial intelligence and digital platforms.”

On these lines, JITOA announced the support of a local developer that will help position Jordan as the first deaf friendly Arab country through the use of a specialised tool aimed at facilitating live interactions between tourists with impaired hearing and their tourism service providers, according to a press release by the association. 

“As a follow step, JITOA will be seeking partners to transform the walking experiences in Amman into a digital one,” the organisers said in the press release.

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