Foster promotes Northern Ireland tourism in India

Tourism Minister Arlene Foster has encouraged Indian travel companies to promote Northern Ireland as a tourist and business destination.

The Minister was visiting Mumbai as part of an Invest Northern Ireland, 26 company-strong, trade and investment mission to India.

Arlene Foster addressed an audience of over 50 key representatives from the travel trade, including partner airlines and travel writers, at a Tourism Ireland event in Mumbai.

The Minister said: “Northern Ireland recognises India’s increasing tourism potential. The United Nations World Tourism Organisation has identified India as one of the fastest growing outbound travel markets of the next decade. Our aim is to attract a share of the eight million Indians who holiday overseas each year. This figure is set to rise to over 50 million by 2020.

“Tourism Ireland’s office in Mumbai has spent its five years in India developing tourism industry links with the aim of growing the 300,000 Indian visitors that already travel to the UK annually.

“While London has become one of the most popular destinations for Indian travellers, Northern Ireland must capitalise on the presence of its vibrant and long-established Indian community. Over 2,000 people currently reside here and a further 1,500 are in employment. It therefore makes good sense to target those Indian tourists travelling to the UK and encourage them to include Northern Ireland as part of their trip.”

Arlene Foster concluded: “In the Programme for Government, the Executive has set the ambitious goal of increasing the number of tourists visiting Northern Ireland to 2.5 million and grow tourism revenue to £520million each year by 2011. India has an untapped tourism potential that, if fully realised, could make a significant contribution to meeting these challenging targets.”

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