By Amr Emam Tourism Minister Rania el-Mashat has expressed optimism about the prospects of religious tourism in Egypt in the years to come. Religious sites, she said, can attract around 16 million tourists every year. Meanwhile, improved security, a growing inflow of tourists and the fact that many of the countries that imposed travel bans on Egypt are lifting those bans now are things that fill millions of tourism workers with optimism. Tough conditions in the tourism sector in the past few years seem, however, to have taught everybody involved in the industry a lesson: the tourism sector is always badly in need of new, flexible and innovative strategies to be able to overcome any challenges it may meet. Now, tourism experts say for the tourism sector to keep going and improving, the government must pay more attention to Sinai, for many years the national hub of tourism investments. "Sorry to say, Sinai's attraction for tourism investments weakened greatly in the past few years," said independent tourism expert Emad el-Tarabishi. "Complicated tourism investment administrative procedures scared a large number of tourism investors from Sinai," the weekly magazine, Akhir Saa'a, quoted el-Tarabishi as saying. Southern Sinai in particular is home to hundreds of tourist projects and facilities that used to attract millions of tourists to them every year. These facilities were deeply affected by the recession that hit the tourist market in late 2015 when a Russian passenger plane exploded in mid-air over Sinai. The bombing precipitated a series of travel suspensions to the Red Sea resorts, including Sharm el-Sheikh and Hurghada. The travel suspensions brought an unprecedented recession to the tourism sector which affected the overall economy for several reasons. One of the reasons was that this sector employs close to four million people, according to the Tourism Ministry. Most of the travel suspensions for the Red Sea resorts are terminated now and tourists have started returning. Tourism experts say, however, the government needs to capitalise on these positive developments by solving the problems of the tourism sector. One of the problems, according to el-Tarabishi, is the lack of funding for small projects in the sector. He called on the government to bring the private sector and the government sector together with the aim of opening the door with the presence of sufficient financing for small tourism projects. "These small projects create jobs for a great many people," el-Tarabishi said. "They also offer great services to the tourism sector as a whole." He also called for organising a large number of tourism festivals, expecting these festivals to turn into magnets for local and foreign tourists everywhere in Egypt. Atef Abdelatif, a member of the South Sinai Investors' Society, called for implementing a previously announced initiative by the Central Bank of Egypt to offer financial support to tourism investors who faced financial problems. The initiative allocated LE5 billion pounds to support the owners of these projects, especially those who were affected by the recession that hit the tourism sector in the past two years. "Implementing the initiative is a challenging mission, in fact," Abdelatif said. He added that in the years of recession, a large number of those who worked in the tourism sector left this sector for other jobs. These workers, he said, are returning to the sector now with conditions gradually improving. "They, however, need training, having stayed away from the tourism sector for close to two years," Abdelatif said of the workers.
