Tourism development issues were discussed at Government of Bashkortostan

UFA, 13 September 2017. /Bashinform News Agency/. The Head of Bashkortostan Rustem Khamitov held a meeting of the Government of the republic. In particular, development of domestic and inbound tourism issue were discussed there.

"We can say that our tourism industry found a new lease of life mainly due to the SCO and BRICS Summits, large international and all-Russian forums, great work on improvement, development of transport, hotel, service infrastructure, information activity," Rustem Khamitov said. "According to the main indicators in the sphere of tourism, the republic was included in the top three leaders of the Volga Federal District and the top ten in the country. According to the results of the last year in the rating of the authoritative branch publication "Rest in Russia" the republic from the 20th place in 2015 rose to the 12th in 2016. The "Turstat" agency included Bashkortostan in Top-5 regions of Russia in terms of growth of domestic tourism".

The Head of the Region said that last year the volume of tourism services grew by 14 percent and exceeded 17 billion rubles. The tourist flow reached almost 2 million people. The volume of tax revenues increased by 11 percent and amounted to 769 million rubles. At the same time, according to the Head of the Republic, the pace of tourism development can be much higher, since in Bashkortostan there are opportunities for almost all kinds of entertaining and sport tourism for all seasons.

"Many components of the tourist infrastructure are still poorly developed - transport, accommodation, food, service, leisure, equipment rental. Tourists often have nothing to spend money on. Insufficient amount of rated tourist facilities, the condition and equipment of many of them do not meet the needs of guests and modern requirements," stressed Rustem Khamitov.

The state program for the development of domestic and incoming tourism in the republic until 2023 is intended to solve these problems, which was presented by the Chairman of the State Committee RB for Entrepreneurship and Tourism Vyacheslav Gilyazitdinov.

The program will be financed almost by 0.5 billion rubles. Its purpose is to create conditions for the formation of a modern competitive tourist and recreational complex, ensuring the development of the necessary infrastructure, the growth of internal and external tourist flows.

Within the framework of the program, a transition from a point-based principle of the tourist industry development to a cluster one will be realized. According to Vyacheslav Gilyazitdinov, by 2023 the volume of sales of services in tourism will amount to almost 26 billion rubles, with growth of 59 percent to the level of 2017. The number of tourists coming to the republic will grow from 950 thousand to 1.5 million people. At the same time, the tourist flow, taking into account visitors to nature reserves and excursionists, will double and reach 3 million people.

The Head of the Republic stressed that it would be necessary to think over additional incentives for investors who were ready to invest in long-term tourism projects and instructed to prepare relevant proposals.