Oman’s MICE sector to get a boost
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Progress for the construction of the new Oman Convention Bureau was recently announced by the Ministry of Tourism, Oman.
Details of the new Bureau’s operating remit and planned opening were disclosed at the on-going Arabian Travel Market (ATM) 2016.
Oman’s director general of tourism promotion Salim Al Mamari said: “Our tourism strategy for 2040 has MICE as a major pillar for the future to help us grow and enhance the industry. The objective of the Bureau is to support international and local organizations in hosting their events and cater to requirements.”
The MICE segment will receive a significant boost in 2016 with scheduled opening of the Oman Convention Centre in Muscat in the last quarter of this year. The convention centre will include theatres, conference rooms and four hotels with almost 1000 rooms along with major exhibition halls.
The sector will also be boosted by ongoing expansions and enhancement of Muscat International Airport that will initially increase capacity to 12 million passengers a year arriving in a modern new terminal and with capacity to expand to take up to 48 m passengers a year.
Al Mamari further added: “The tourism industry in Oman is growing at a rapid rate. We saw a 17.7% increase in visitor numbers in 2015 alone taking annual numbers to 2.4 m. Tourism is set to be one of the key pillars for economic growth in the Sultanate in the coming decades and that means ensuring that we have a plentiful supply of quality hotel rooms for our guests from around the world.”
The ambitious new tourism strategy for Oman plans to grow international visitor numbers to 5.3 million by 2040.
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