The Bahrain Tourism and Exhibitions Authority (BTEA) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Information & eGovernment Authority to implement the third phase of the ‘Tourism Statistics Development’ programme in line with the requirements of the World Tourism Organization.

The ‘Tourism Statistics Development’ programme closely monitors the inbound and outbound tourism movement and provides a detailed overview of the tourism sector and its contribution to the national economy.

The chief executive officer of BTEA, Shaikh Khaled bin Humood Al Khalifa, and the chief executive officer of the Information & eGovernment Authority, Mohammed Ali Al Qaed, signed a collaboration agreement to implement the ‘Tourism Statistics Development’ Program  for the year 2016-2017 in three separate phases.

The third phase of the program will examine the wages and salaries structure and evaluate investment in tourism initiatives; this will result in the development of an integrated database for decision makers and policy makers. The program also quantifies the demand for recreation and entertainment activities which is an important component to the preparation of the sub-tourism account, one of the main tools for measuring the contribution of the Kingdom’s tourism sector to the national economy.

"The third phase of the survey will be based on methodological foundations and recognised international standards and will include input from over 30,000 visitors. Insights will also focus on tourism expenditure. The survey will gather data measuring the productivity of tourism facilities including hotels, restaurants, travel agencies, in addition to the international exhibitions and conferences held in the Kingdom,” said the chief executive officer of BTEA, Shaikh Khaled bin Humood Al Khalifa.

The ‘Tourism Statistics Development’ programme aims to develop a comprehensive database which will determine the growth and development indicators of the industry and its overall contribution to the national economy. The implementation of the program will take 18 months to complete and is being carried out in three phases. The first phase focused on developing the program, while the second phase focused on collecting data for the survey by interviewing passengers arriving through Bahrain International Airport and King Fahad Bridge. The interviews provided accurate data regarding the main purpose of travel and the rate of tourism expenditure.

In addition, the program measures the total revenues generated from the hospitality sector through indicators such as the length of stay, the number of restaurants visited, total nights booked, type of accommodation booked and the total occupancy rate of hotels which determines the tourism sector’s overall contribution to the GDP. The program also focuses on other tourism related activities that contribute to the national economy, including the number of inbound tourists, the rate of spending, and the success of events held in the kingdom. - TradeArabia News Service