Spain hopes to receive 1 million of Russian tourists this year, - declared the participants of press-conference carried out in the network of MITT-2011 exhibition.
Touristic authorities of Spain have arranged a press-conference dedicated to the year of Russia in Spain in the network of MITT-2011. 2011 is declared as the year of Spain in Russia and as a part of this event an exhibition called “Spain: Life and Innovations” will take place in Moscow. The exhibition is organized by Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ministry of Industry, tourism and commerce of Spain. The exhibition will be taking place in Manege from March 28th till April 1st. A Week of Spain will take place in Moscow in June; Spanish cooking will be the topic of this event.
"The man, who has been acknowledged the world’s best cook for five consecutive years, lives in Spain. He is going to visit Moscow and present the Spanish cooking in the network of this week. Spanish night-life will be the second topic. We also plan to operate in some Moscow business-centers, carry out street promotion actions and promote the country in social networks. We have already spent €150,000 on advertising campaign and we are going to invest more money in promotion of Spain and Spanish regions ", - said Felix de Pas Garcia, tourism counselor at the embassy of Spain.
He noted that advertising campaign has already yielded benefit. 603,273 tourists have visited Spain in 2010, this number is greater than the same figure for 2009 by 43,4%. The number of tourists has increased by 24% during the first two months of the year and the Spanish consulate has registered an increase of issued visas number by 33%. "Our main task is receiving 1 million Russian tourists this year. An active work of Russian operators, a large number of flights between the countries and solid economic situation in Russia helps us ", - explained Felix de Pas Garcia. He has also underlined that Spain tries to pursue a soft visa policy. "We are still issuing multi-visas with the duration of 6 months and this year we will try to issue visas with the duration of one and three years ", - he said. In addition the new visa application centers are going to be opened in Yekaterinburg, Novosibirsk, Rostov-on-Don and Samara. The advertising campaign of Spain will also be carried out in these cities.
According to Alvaro Blanco, general director of Turespaña (Spanish Institute of Tourism), the country has received more than 52 million tourists in 2010. "Spain is the country with the highest number of cities acknowledged as UNESCO world legacy. And these cities are not just excursion objects, people live in these cities ", - Alvaro Blanco added. And the tourist traffic from Russia increases faster as compared with the other countries.
Spain is constantly developing new travel packages for the tourists. "Operators offered mostly beach-related rest in Spain only five years ago, and now most of the tours include visiting of such cities as Valencia, Barcelona, Madrid, etc. We also plan to develop such types of tourism as city-breaks, for example, a tourist is staying in Madrid for 2-3 days and goes on excursions in the neighboring cities. In addition, Spain has one of the most high-speed trains in the world. Now we are creating special travel program, based on traveling by high-speed trains, and we are going to create special fares for the tourists. A man can visit Zaragoza, Seville, Valencia, Malaga and other cities during one journey ", - said Felix de Pas Garcia.
