Tourism officials on a mission to lure Chinese visitors

AMMAN – Jordan's tourism officials will be on a mission to lure more Chinese tourists to the Kingdom. 

Minister of Tourism and Antiquities Nayef Fayez will be heading a delegation on Wednesday to attend the First World Conference on Tourism for Development that will be held in Beijing between May 18-21. 

The minister said in a statement issued Tuesday that the event would be an opportunity to open new promotion and marketing campaigns in China to attract more tourist groups from the Asian country, which is considered as the world’s largest outbound travel market as some 120 million people travelled overseas last year.

"Jordan is an important tourist destination that offers unique and diversified products and is safe and secure," Fayez said. 

He noted that the event would be a venue to meet Chinese tourism officials and to talk the press there, adding the delegation will also hold meetings with tourism and travel agents as well as representatives of airline companies. 

According to organisers, the event will be jointly organised by the government of China and the World Tourism Organisation (WTO). 

The conference, which coincides with the China Tourism Day, will bring together leaders in the areas of tourism and development to spur dialogue and create a better understanding on tourism’s contribution to development, including poverty alleviation and peace, the WTO said on its website. 

In 2015, the number of tourists from China to Jordan reached 23,000, which is around 16 per cent higher than 2014, according to official figures. 

Tohama Nabulsi, the director of media and communication at the Jordan Tourism Board (JTB), told The Jordan Times previously that among the obstacles that limit tourism between Jordan and China is the lack of direct flights between Amman and Beijing, the language barrier and dietary preferences, or what the official coined tourists’ “loyalty to Chinese food”.

Chinese food restaurants are available in Amman only, she said, adding that JTB will send three Jordanian tour operators to China to learn the language as part of a campaign that will focus on attracting tourists from the economic giant.

Chinese tourists, Nabulsi said, prefer to visit major international attractions in Europe and the US. The JTB will focus on Chinese youth, hoping to attract them to adventures in the Kingdom and will bring Chinese journalists to write about Jordan in an attempt to familiarise the Chinese public with tourist sites the Kingdom has to offer, she said, adding that because Facebook and Twitter are banned in China, JTB is in the process of creating an account on Chinese social media networks.