Join on WhatsApp
Join on Telegram
Rabat – Morocco’s National Tourist Office (ONMT) wrapped up the last phase of its “Light Tour” yesterday in New York, introducing American travelers and investors to the kingdom’s tourism industry.
New York was the last stopover of a three-days tour, which was also held in Paris and London as part of ONMT’s strategy to promote Morocco as a holiday destination, especially for young travelers.
ONMT’s Director of Marketing et valorisation de l’offre Siham Fettouhi delivered a presentation where she shed light on Morocco’s assets as a tourist destination that aims to become one of the top 10 travel destinations worldwide.
Morocco ranked 15th on the list of the top 20 destinations for French tourists in January 2022. The Kingdom also became Africa’s most visited country after Egypt.
“Through this new campaign, the country aims to regain its position as one of the most iconic and inspiring global destinations, a favorite amongst the world’s most discerning and adventurous travelers,” Fettouhi said in the presentation.
Morocco is a country that needs to be experienced through its art, its living culture, and its craftsmanship, she stressed.
She highlighted the country’s breathtaking landscapes, cultural, and heritage sites that attract thousands of locals and foreign visitors annually.
“Over the last twenty years, tourism has been considered a strategic sector that accompanies development, and generates, on average, 7% of the country’s GDP,” Fettouhi added.
The “Light Tour” serves to reinforce the launch of ONMT’s new international communication campaign “Morocco, Land of Light” The campaign seeks to list the kingdom among “the world’s most coveted tourist destinations to reinforce its renown and attractiveness in the international market.”
American tour operators and professionals from the tourism industry screened an institutional film that shed light on Morocco’s rich culture and its thousand-year-old civilization, renowned for its openness to modernity and diversity.
In a speech, the president of the National Confederation of Tourism (CNT) Hamid Bentaher outlined the key elements of the Kingdom’s new promotional campaign, explaining its position as a tourism destination as well as its presence in global markets.
Bentaher recalled that Morocco has been the first tourist destination in Africa for the past five years, welcoming some 13 million tourists annually, noting that the Kingdom was ranked 29th in the world.
As Morocco now sets itself to enter the list of the top 20 tourist destinations in the world, he stressed, it testifies to the efforts made with all stakeholders in the tourism industry to achieve such an objective.
CNT’s president also noted that there are several moves in the making which seeks to strengthen the Moroccan brand among American customers.
Representatives from Morocco’s tourism sector were present at the New York stopover of the “Light Tour” to highlight the kingdom’s tourism offering, while holding business to business (B2B) meetings and establishing new partnerships with American counterparts.
After Morocco’s tourism sector was impacted severely by the COVID-19 pandemic, the government has been taking different measures to gradually revive the tourism sector as it represents a key element of Morocco’s economic development.
The country has recently announced the end of mandatory PCR testing for visitors to Morocco, emphasizing that travelers will no longer need a negative PCR test if they have a vaccine pass.
Unvaccinated people over six years old can now enter Morocco by presenting a negative PCR test.
The tourism sector reached a revenue of MAD 9.7 billion ($968.8 million) in the first quarter of 2022, a 80% increase compared to the same period last year.
Read Also: Unvaccinated Travelers Can Enter Morocco With Negative PCR Test
