Pakistan: As security improves so does tourism
"Other than security, the main improvement in Pakistan has been infrastructure. The roads have improved immeasurably reducing journey times," says Managing Director of Wild Frontiers Adventure Travel Ltd. Photo: Bloomberg
(Web Desk) - Keen to shed the image that it’s unsafe for visitors, Pakistan has begun a blossoming tourism drive and this summer even placed adverts on London’s iconic red buses. Road infrastructure has also improved across key holiday regions.
Since the 2014 massacre of more than 100 children at Army Public School Peshawar, the armed forces of Pakistan have neutered some insurgent groups and other militias. Following the positive events one after the other, tourists are now returning to Pakistan, including areas such as the Swat Valley – a northern region known as the Switzerland of Pakistan that was controlled by the Taliban between 2007 and 2009 and where Nobel Prize winner Malala Yousafzai was shot in 2012.
According to Bloomberg, as security improves, annual tourist arrivals to Pakistan have more than tripled since 2013 to 1.75 million last year, while domestic travelers rose 30 percent to 38.3 million, according to the state-owned Pakistan Tourism Development Corp. Over the same period, foreign tourist arrivals in the country’s larger neighbour, India, jumped from 6.97 million in 2013 to 8.8 million in 2016, government figures show.
The managing director of Wild Frontiers Adventure Travel Ltd. – a London-based operator that has run trips to Pakistan for two decades, Jonny Bealby said his tours to the South Asian nation are up 60 percent from last year.
Bealby also said that other than security, the main improvement in Pakistan has been infrastructure.
“The roads have improved immeasurably reducing journey times,’’ he said.
Tourism in Pakistan. Photo: Pakistan Tourism Development Corp.
Visa Challenges
According to Jovago, Pakistan’s biggest accommodation booking website, hotel bookings in the country have also increased by 80 percent since last year. Many Pakistanis want to travel, but going abroad is difficult, said Nadine Malik, chief executive officer of Jovago Asia.
“It’s hard to get visas -- it’s not easy and it’s not cheap,’’ she said in an interview in Karachi.
Likewise, for many foreigners getting a Pakistan visa is expensive and bureaucratic, said Ayesha Siddiqa, a research associate at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London, reported Bloomberg.
“A lot of people go to India because it publicizes itself as a tourist destination,’’ Siddiqa said.
Mukhatar Ali, a spokesman for a Pakistan tourism agency has said that while the government is considering expanding the visa-on-arrival service beyond the current 16 countries, it hasn’t yet specified which ones.
Meanwhile, places like the northern town of Naran are buzzing with construction work, hotels and restaurants enjoy a healthy trade across the country where even in Karachi – the trade capital, port city that lately had been victimised by gang and political violence, tourism in and around the city has taken hold.
