19 September 2008 | Turkey’s government and tourism business representatives intend to start by the end of the year a project for the promotion and development of tourism in Turkey, international media reported today.

The project, worth 320 million US dollars, or about 225 million euro, will be jointly financed, the Bulgarian website horemag.bg reported. The government plans to contribute 120 million US dollars (about 85 million euro) while the private sector, consisting of tour agencies and hotel owners, will contribute the rest.

The main part of the project is a massive advertisement campaign, aimed at increasing by 2012 the number of visitors to Turkey to 60 million and the income from tourism to 50 billion US dollars (around 35 billion euro) per year.

As a comparison, it is expected that the number of tourists who visit Turkey in 2008 will reach 25 million, generating an income of 25 billion US dollars (around 17.6 billion euro) by the end of the year. As BalkanTravellers.com reported recently, in the first seven months of the year, the number of visitors to the country reached over 14.5 million, which was a 15.33 per cent increase compared with 2007.

The advertising campaign intends to promote Turkey as a tourist destination to new markets and introduce it as an year-round tourist destination, as well as to retain its already established key positions worldwide.

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