Hossein Mohammad Pour Zarandi, CEO and Vice Chairman of City Bank of Iran addressed Conference on Economy of Urban Tourism on Monday on the issue of tourism and its contribution to successful world economies; “In 2012, about 10 percent of global GDP and one out of 11 jobs were filled in tourism industry; as such, the Conference prioritizes tourism as one of the main topics and holds a specialized panel to which academicians will contribute,” he added.
“Cities are both source and destination of tourism; the share of urban tourism in international tourism is on rise. City magistrates have gradually moved toward improvement of tourism infrastructures, as it attracts much revenue to the municipalities,” said the CEO of City Bank of Iran.
“Tourism is considered as one of the most profitable industries around the world in the third millennium; the number of international tourists were 20 million in 1950; 438 million in 1980; 880 million in 2012; and more than a billion in 2012. It is estimated that it will reach to 1.6 billion people by 2020. If 1000 USD is considered as a turnover from each tourist, we may reach to stunning figure of $1,600 billion,” he detailed.
“Tourism is the biggest service sector only next to banking in international business according to the international bodies such as OCED; nearly 15 percent of French and Italian GDP and more than 10 percent of UK and US GDP come by tourism,” Hossein Mohammad Pour Zarandi added.
“City officials should promote particular and functional tourism infrastructures; a process can be defined which would help city management to invest tourism revenues in other projects to improve public welfare,” he proposed.
Conference on Economy of Urban Tourism will be held on May 19 in Tehran where Iranian and foreign academicians as well as experts will participate. The major organizer of the event is Iran Urban Economics Scientific Association IUESA. Notable among participants and contributors are Interior Ministry, Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance, Allameh Tabatabaei University, Imam Sadiq University, Tehran City Council, Qazvin Municipality, Shiraz Municipality, University of Jihad, Asian Mayors Forum, UNESCO, UCLG/MEWA, and METROPOLISE.
Those interested can visit conference website for more information: www.conference.iuea.ir
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