The Tourism Activation Authority (TAA) set the cost of participating in the World Travel Market (WTM) tourism bourse in London in November at €2,530 per company. The price was published in a publication sent to members of the Egyptian Travel Agents Association (ETAA) and the Egyptian Chamber of Hotels. The ETAA extended the deadline for participation to 5 September, compared to the previous 7 August date for submitting documents in order to participate, according to the publication. The WTM exhibition, held in London at the beginning of November each year, is one of the most important annual exhibitions in which the TAA participates. The British market is also one of the most important markets exporting tourism to Egypt annually, and ranked third after Russia and Germany last year. Approximately 850,000 British tourists visited Egypt last year. The Ministry of Tourism has reduced participation in tourism fairs in light of a 25% funding decrease for the TAA for the 2014/2015 fiscal year according to a TAA official. The TAA coordinates with both the ETAA and the Chamber of Hotels to establish a presence in European markets, which represent 72% of tourist influx to Egypt annually. The number of tourists visiting Egypt fell during the first half of this year to 4.5 million, a 25% drop from the same period in 2013. The Ministry of Tourism is set to intensify its presence in Western Europe, which represents Egypt's main source of tourism, through a six-month marketing campaign. The ministry has reduced the cost of participating in a tourism conference to be held in Barcelona in May to €1,500 from €3,000, said Adel Zaky, chairman of the Foreign Tourism Committee at the ETAA. Zaky explained that the ministry's move to reduce participation costs in international exhibitions is part of the TAA plan to increase presence in European markets for FY 2014/2015. Tourism Minister Hisham Zaazou said in recent press statements that his ministry was working to increase marketing efforts for cultural tourism especially in Luxor and Aswan during the coming winter season. Luxor recently welcomed Germany's QTA alliance whose sales reached €4.1m last year according to Zaazou. The move forms part of measures taken to attract major tourism alliances to visit Luxor and Aswan. There are 250 exotic tourism companies in the ETAA of a total 3,000 companies according to Zaky, who added that 60 companies participated in last year's exhibition after the price was decreased from €3,000 to €2,530. The Foreign Tourism Committee requested that participation fees be reduced for the exhibition in order to increase the number of participating companies to 80, Zaky said. "The majority of the companies participating in tourism exhibitions in Western Europe are advertising cultural tourism, which was severely damaged over the past three and a half years," said Zaky. He predicted that the ministry would reduce participation costs to approximately €2,000 to encourage companies to participate.
