Prime Minister Sherif Ismail approved the formation of the Supreme Committee for the Revitalisation of Tourism with members including the ministers of tourism and aviation, governors of South Sinai, the Red Sea, and Luxor, and seven investors from the tourism sector.
This came during a meeting between the prime minister and investors from the tourism sector held on Wednesday in Sharm El-Sheikh.
Kamel Abu Ali, head of the Red Sea Investors Association, told Daily News Egypt that the Supreme Committee for the Revitalisation of Tourism is mandated to develop marketing and promotional plans for tourist destinations in Egypt. They agreed upon studying the cons of the government’s decision regarding increasing fees of entry visas and presenting their findings to the cabinet within 48 hours.
He pointed to the preliminary approval of the prime minister to postpone the government dues on the tourism sector until the end of this year.
He said that the committee will prepare a comparative study of fuel prices and landing and take-off fees at airports, as well as accommodation and departure fees of countries in the region rivalling Egypt as a tourist destination.
The committee will include a number of experts, both foreign and local. Tourism investors requested postponing the sector’s dues to the government agencies to the end of December 2017, and Ismail promised to study this matter in order to ease the burden on investors.
President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi headed the first meeting of the Supreme Council for the Revitalisation of Tourism, and the meeting discussed the possibility of applying an open skies policy in order to encourage private aviation companies’ influxes to Egypt.
The president stressed the importance of promoting Egyptian tourism and highlighting its characteristics and diversity, along with preparing an integrated study for the development of the roads network in South Sinai to be completed within three months, in addition to the establishment of social housing units in South Sinai to serve workers in the tourism sector in this region.
