Dubai’s vibrant tourism industry is all set to showcase its ever-enhancing appeal as a year-round business and leisure destination to the world at the upcoming Arabian Travel Market (ATM) expo.

One of the biggest travel and tourism show in the world, ATM will be held from April 30 to May 3 at the Dubai International Convention and Exhibition Centre.

Like the previous 18 years of its participation, the Department of Tourism and Commerce Marketing (DTCM) will be utilizing the popular travel and tourism show this year to promote several of its initiatives including the new hotel classification scheme, and Dubai Green Tourism Award.

Announcing the ATM details on Tuesday, Saleh Al Geziry, DTCM director of overseas promotions and inward missions, said Dubai Stand measures 1195 sq m and will have 183 co-participants, an increase of four per cent over the previous edition.
 
Among the co-participants are Dubai Police, General Directorate of Residency and Foreigners Affairs (GDRFA-Dubai), Dubai World Trade Centre, Dubai Healthcare City and Ministry of Social Affairs and Community Development.

This year, the Dubai Stand will see 16 new co-participants. These are Aero Space Tourism, Dubai Camel Racing Club, Skylink Travels, Rixos Hotel, Peacock International Hotel, Balloon Adventures Emirates, Suha City Hotel, Europcar, Easy Booking Tourism, Royal Pamir Travels, Belhasa Travel, Hues Boutique Hotel, Cosmopolitan Hotel, Tropic International Tourism and Travel, Mount Royal Hotel and Montreal Hotel.

Al Geziry said Dubai Stand co-participants will be showcasing their latest tourism products offering while the DTCM will be utilising the opportunity to promote and market various initiatives like New Hotel Classification, Definitely Dubai, Dubai Experts and Dubai Green Tourism Award.

He said Dubai tourism industry had delivered a stellar performance in 2011 and also in the first quarter of 2012. Dubai has further consolidated its position on the world tourism map with its hotels and hotel apartments posting impressive all-round performance in hotel guest numbers, cruise passengers, revenues, guest nights and average length of stay.

According to Al Geziry, Dubai had hosted 9.3 million hotel guests and cruise passengers in 2011, up 10 per cent compared to the previous year’s 8.49 million and the guest nights rose to 32,848,190 in 2011, thus registering a 23 per cent growth over the previous year.

The revenues of hotels and hotel apartments increased by 20 per cent to touch Dh16 billion. The emirate continued its strong growth levels with Dubai being placed first globally for hotel occupancy levels and average revenue per room (RevPAR) for the month of January 2012 in a STR Global report of Top 15 destinations.-TradeArabia News Service