Minister Angelkova met Peter Fankhauser, CEO of Thomas Cook Group, in Argentina

„Partnership with large tour operators, such as Thomas Cook, is very important to us and I am happy that it has been yielding such good results over a limited time“. Thus said the Minister of Tourism, Nikolina Angelkova, during a work meeting with Peter Fankhauser, CEO of Thomas Cook Group. The two conversed in Buenos Aires, during the summit meeting of the World Travel and Tourism Council. The minister emphasized that during this season Bulgaria is establishing itself as one of the most preferred destinations in the region, with significant growth being reported in a number of markets, Germany being among the more considerable ones. It was made clear during the meetings that there is a 10% growth in the tourists choosing our country for their vacation via Thomas Cook.

Peter Fankhauser emphasized that it is very important to keep up the work in Bulgaria to ensure the tourism product’s quality. The two discussed the investment opportunities at the Bulgarian Black Sea coast, as well as the development of combined types of tourism – medical spa with summer tourism or marine tourism with cultural-historical tourism, which will expand the summer season’s duration.

The Bulgarian minister emphasized that 2017 was a record-breaking year for the entire history of the sector in our country and that she is hopeful that the growth in the number of tourists and in revenues would still be exceeded this year.

Minister Angelkova emphasized that her institution’s marketing activities were yielding increasingly better results. Last year, revenues from international tourism in Bulgaria stood at nearly 6.9 bil., a 9.3 per cent growth compared to the hitherto record-breaking year 2016

The Russian market is exceptionally important for incoming tourism to Bulgaria, indicated Angelkova, announcing that in 2017 Russia ranked 5^th in terms of tourism visits in our country, with some 558 000 visits.

Remote and new markets are also important to us because Bulgaria is still not very popular there as a 4-season route, said Minister Angelkova. She cited China as an example, as it generated over 26 000 tourism travels to Bulgaria in 2017, an over 41 per cent increase, compared to 2016. The potential, nonetheless, is much bigger, therefore we are prepared, together with other countries in the region, to offer joint tourism routes.