UAE tourism gets a major push from the Indian tourists, perking up its hotel industry

Published on : Thursday, December 13, 2018

Indian is encouraged by its pace-setting 7% GDP growth. Currently, it’s one of the highest growing outbound travel market in the world, second to China, said the Colliers International report on Mena hotels.

In 2018, total Indian outbound tourism departures (worldwide) will be 22.5 million and this is anticipated to reach 50 million by 2022. Around 5.4 million Indian tourists visited GCC states this year and this is hope to rise to 9 million tourists in 2022, said the report.

“37 per cent of India’s outbound market travels to the GCC. The popularity of this region as a destination for business, place of work and leisure underpins this demand,” said the report.

“Tourist arrivals from India into the GCC have witnessed constant progression year on year. The United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) estimates that India will account for over 50 million outbound tourists by 2022, making India a $45 billion outbound spend market,” said the report.

In spite of the delay due to Indian rupee fluctuations, the Indian outbound market has been rising at an average annual growth rate of 10-12 percent in the last seven years.

To put things into the standpoint, India has been the major source market for Dubai in the past three years. In 2017, UAE greeted 2.3 million Indian tourists, accounting for 13 per cent of its annual visitors, in general. This is 15 percent greater than that of UAE’s second largest source market, Saudi Arabia, the report said.