Minister Angelkova: We expect over 10 thousand people to visit Veliko Tarnovo in the four days of the Cultural Toursim exhibition

“In the past year, over 10 thousand people visited Veliko Tarnovo during the four days of the Cultural Tourism International Tourist Exhibition. We hope this year to perform even better”, minister of tourism Nikolina Angelkova said at the official opening of the exchange. Among the official attendees were the mayor of the city Daniel Panov, the regional governor prof. Pencho Penchev, other mayors from across the country, the chairperson of the Bulgarian Hotel and Restaurant Association Blagoy Ragin, the archeologist prof. Nikolay Ovcharov, etc.

“Bulgaria ranks at the forefront in almost any European ranking with its cultural activities “, pointed out Nikolina Angelkova. In her words, according to a specialized marketing research, many tourists from our leading markets have visited Bulgaria namely because of the opportunities for practising cultural-historical tourism”, the minister said. In 2015, Veliko Tarnovo region was visited by over 182 thousand tourists, posting yet another annual growth of 5%. The generated income from those visits is over 11 million leva, marking a 12% rise compared with 2014.

Nikolina Angelkova added that the Ministry of Tourism continued proactively its work for promoting domestic tourism. Thanks to the joint efforts between the local authority, the businesses and the academia the old capital city is an example of tourism growth sustainability. “We see that cultural tourism in Veliko Tarnovo plays a leading role for Bulgaria to be an all year-round and popular destination because more and more tourists choose culture and history as a reason to visit Bulgaria and its old capital”, said Nikolina Angelkova.

She recalled that cultural-historical tourism is a key priority in the advertising and marketing policy of the ministry and successfully combines with the mass summer and winter product.  Veliko Tarnovo will be included in the interactive tourist maps which are being developed by the ministry for each of the identified cultural destinations and the online Register of the Tourist Attractions has been further extended to become national with the amendments to the Law on Tourism, announced the minister. It covers over 3300 sites, including 40 from the area of the old capital city. This year a new initiative will be launched – the development of a platform that will consolidate information about all festivals and other similar events which generate tourist interest. The platform will be accessible online from a single site, i.e. the website of the ministry.

The Cultural Tourism exhibition in Veliko Tarnovo is the biggest and most important dedicated event with international presence in the country. The participants in its 13^th edition are representatives of over 40 Bulgarian municipalities, and of the embassies of SAR, Indonesia, Vietnam, Hungary, Azerbaijan, and France. Among the support events this year are the traditional International Tourism Film Festival “On the East Coast of Europe”, ethnographic exhibitions and round tables for discussing the prospects for development of cultural tourism and conservation of cultural heritage, etc.  In the first day of the forum the annual meeting of the minister of tourism with the mayors of Bulgarian municipalities is held, at which over 70 mayors and local tourism experts are to be present.