Even if visitors are of the low-cost category , they are still spending something in our country , the Minister opined .
He clearly feels that irrespective of all the studies that are being done , tourism needs to see that the figures it is creating are being managed well , adding as an example that “ in January ’ s 2015 we registered about 100,000 tourists , and in August we registered about 260,000 .” The theory is that numbers can indeed be managed into a wider spread . He went on to explain that Gozo can suffer from seasonality more than Malta does . So it is not a question of saying that we have surpassed our saturation point - we need to acknowledge that these advances can be leveraged towards filling the lower months just as amply . “ The infrastructural challenges are there and have to be addressed ” stressed Minister Zammit Lewis .
“ We see the growth of medical tourism in Gozo to be an important input for the island , if not the one with the most interesting potential indeed . This form of tourism does not refer simply to hospitals but more so to the infrastructure and services that will fit around the hospital itself . This is a medium to long-term objective .”
April shoulder periods because the better we fare in this period the better the overall advantage for the country will be . “ Let ’ s be fair ,” he said , “ if our arrival figures remain as those of May to September 2016 , these are already in themselves good and satisfactory . In other words , the excess capacity that we have is probably between November and March .
“ Furthermore , next year we have the additional advantage of Malta ’ s EU Presidency and that can also come to our benefit in terms of numbers . As I see it , the 2 million tourist mark would still be reached with or without the Presidency advantage . But the Presidency could easily give some off-peak extraordinary figures in itself so one has to wait and see ,” he opined .
“ we have to re-think how to organise our transport , and we have to re-learn how to travel in our own country ”
Four objectives beyond 2020
Looking at policies and strategies that will lead us to 2020 and beyond , Dr Zammit Lewis put forward his own vision . “ I identify 4 main objectives , that are reachable and are not simply dreams for the coming year . And we must make an earnest effort to reach them ,” he said .
The first objective for him is obviously to reach that target figure of 2 million tourists in 2017 . His second objective is to focus on seasonality , so that the number-crunching can be managed in a practical manner . The emphasis here is to fill the October to
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HOSPITALITY MALTA