Tourism 70 million tourists to visit Saudi Arabia this year By Reuters May 10, 2022 Thomson Reuters/MOHAMMED BENMANSOUR Cruise ships, such as this one in Jeddah, will add to the influx of tourists Saudi Arabia aims to exceed 70 million tourist visits this year, up eight million on the year before. The kingdom has in recent years started to promote leisure travel as part of a strategy aimed at diversifying the economy away from oil, spearheaded by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Visits were up 130 percent in the first quarter of 2022 compared with the last quarter of 2019, Saudi Tourism Authority CEO Fahd Hamidaddin said at the Arabian Travel Market in Dubai. “I think our record-high domestic travel was last year,” Hamidaddin said. “And on general recovery of total travel, we outperformed the globe, we outperformed the region in terms of recovery – we reached 72 percent of pre-pandemic levels. “I’ll say this for the first time …we are witnessing over 130 percent versus pre-pandemic levels,” Hamidaddin said, adding this pertained to the leisure tourism segment only and did not include religious travel. Saudi Arabia expects to open the doors of several tourism-focused projects over the next few years, including the Red Sea project, a high-end development that will feature resorts on islands and inland. “We’re very pleased to see Dubai successful, just like Jordan, just like Egypt, all recovering and growing. And we want to play our role – and we believe that our success is success for everyone,” Hamidaddin said, addressing a question about regional competition.
