AMMAN —
The
Jordan Strategy Forum (JSF) has said that the Kingdom’s income from
international tourism is “significantly high”, with the percentage of tourism
income to total exports reached about 40 percent during the period 2016–2019, a
figure that exceeds those of most countries in the world, with the exception of
three: the Maldives, the Bahamas, and Lebanon, Al-Mamlaka TV reported on
Wednesday.
اضافة اعلان
The JSF indicated
that Jordan’s tourism income, by country, comes mainly from Jordanians residing
abroad/expatriates (41.7 percent), other Arab countries (28.1 percent), foreign
countries (15.2 percent), and the Arab Gulf states (15percent).
The figures
appeared in a policy paper titled “Tourism in the Jordanian Economy: An
Opportunity to Promote Growth”, and highlight the importance of the tourism to
Jordan’s trade balance.
The forum pointed
to the remarkable improvement witnessed by the tourism sector in the aftermath
of the
COVID-19 pandemic, with tourism income increasing by nearly double, from
JD1 billion in 2020 to JD1.9 billion in 2021.
The JSF also
indicated that income from tourism in 2022 has witnessed a significant
increase, reaching JD3 billion during the first three quarters of the year, as
a result of the increase in the number of tourists coming to the Kingdom, which
numbered 3.7 million.
In its paper, the
forum reviewed Jordan’s performance on the
Travel and Tourism Development Index
for the year 2021, which studies a number of indicators and measures their
progress. The index aims to guide investment policies and decisions related to
business development in the sector as a whole.
The paper said
that Japan was the country with the best performance, with a score of 5.2/7,
while Chad was the weakest performing country, with a score of 2.5/7, ranking
last (117).
The forum also
said that Jordan’s performance was average, with a score of 3.9/7 and a global
rank of 64 out of 117. Among Arab countries, the UAE ranked first at 25/117
globally.
Jordan ranked
sixth in the Arab world.
The JSF drew
attention to the large variance in Jordan’s performance on the sub-indicators
of the index, with tourism and travel policies performing the best, ranking
33/117, while the sustainability of the sector ranked 72/117.
The forum stressed
the need to work on improving Jordan’s performance in the sub-indicators of
each axis. Regarding the enabling environment, the forum mentioned Jordan’s
weak performance in ICT readiness (71/117), and on the axis of health and hygiene
(68/117).
Regarding tourism
and travel policies, the forum pointed to Jordan’s weak performance in price
competitiveness (83/117). With regard to infrastructure, Jordan’s performance
was noticeably poor (69/117), and regarding land transport and port infrastructure,
Jordan ranked (61/117).
As for the sustainability
of the travel and tourism sector, the forum pointed to Jordan’s weak
performance in terms of economic resilience and social conditions (117/88).
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