By Manal Abdel Fattah
Ambassador Hero Mustafa Garg, Ambassador of the United States of America in Cairo, met with the Minister of Tourism and Antiquities, Ahmed Issa, in his office at the Ministry’s headquarters in the New Administrative Capital, to discuss ways to enhance cooperation between the two countries at the tourism and archaeological levels, in addition to discussing tourism investment opportunities in Egypt.
For her part, Ambassador Hero Mostafa Garg referred to her visit to the Giza Pyramids, ancient Egypt and historic Cairo to enjoy their ancient antiquities, praising the distinguished relations between the two countries and stressing the need to support and strengthen those relations, especially in the field of tourism and antiquities.
During the meeting, reference was made to the existing and fruitful cooperation between the two sides in the field of tourism and antiquities, and the efforts made in cooperation with the United States Agency for International Development in many development projects in the field of tourism, preserving antiquities and heritage, enhancing and raising the efficiency of various tourist and archaeological sites, raising and strengthening tourism and archaeological awareness, and developing skills. The communities surrounding these sites.
The Minister reviewed the indicators of incoming tourist traffic to Egypt in general and from the American market in particular, stressing that incoming tourist traffic from the American market has achieved a record high this year.
It also talks about the efforts made by the Egyptian state to support and advance the tourism industry in Egypt, noting the incentive package recently approved by the Council of Ministers to encourage the tourism sector to accelerate the expansion of investment in building hotel rooms in a way that contributes to absorbing the expected increase in the number of incoming tourists. For Egypt, the country aims to reach 30 million tourists by 2028.
He pointed out that improving the tourism investment climate in Egypt and increasing the number of hotel rooms there is one of the axes of the national strategy for tourism development in Egypt, which he reviewed during the meeting.
He also spoke about what the Supreme Council of Antiquities has been witnessing recently towards achieving financial sustainability and increasing rates of spending and revenues, pointing to the Council’s success during the current fiscal year in reducing its dependence on the state’s general budget due to the efforts of the employees of the Supreme Council of Antiquities and increasing the prices of tickets for visiting museums and archaeological sites, which resulted in The council’s revenues will increase five times, which will contribute to increasing the council’s ability to finance development and restoration projects and provide the expenditure that archaeological sites and museums deserve in order to improve the tourism experience for visitors, pointing to the Ministry’s cooperation with the private sector to provide and operate services at a number of these sites and museums.
During the meeting, they discussed the visit to Egypt of the famous American basketball team Harlem Globetrotters, which is an exhibition basketball team whose playing style combines sports, theater and comedy.
