Saudi Arabia, Qatar to add more direct China flights to give post-pandemic tourism a lift
This followed the launch of direct flights by Saudi Arabian Airlines from Jeddah and Riyadh to Beijing and Guangzhou last year.
Al-Khateeb also said there were plans in the pipeline for more direct flights between Saudi Arabia and Hong Kong, with details to be announced “very soon”.
“China is very important to us. Therefore we put China at the top of the best [place] to promote Saudi Arabia and advocate the Chinese to Saudi Arabia,” he said.
Last year, of the 100 million tourists to Saudi Arabia, nearly 150,000 were Chinese. The kingdom is aiming to attract 5 million Chinese tourists by 2030.
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Southeast Asian aviation industry is booming amid return of tourism
Separately, Qatar Tourism chairman Saad Al Kharji, said Qatar and China were in advanced talks over increasing the number of direct flights as the Gulf nation steps up tourism promotion.
“We’re focused on China … to get more tourists from there,” he said on the sidelines of the forum on Wednesday, noting that tourism in Qatar was recovering “very fast”, especially among Chinese tourists, and was “very resilient” and “can grow back again”.
China Southern added a new route between Doha and Guangzhou in April, increasing its total to four direct flights a week. It also joins Cathay Pacific and Xiamen Airlines as the third Chinese code-share partner offering direct services to Doha.
According to a report by Doha News on Monday, tourism accounted for 10.3 per cent of Qatar’s overall economic output in 2023, hitting a record of QAR81.2 billion (US$22 billion).
Meanwhile, figures provided by the Arabian Travel Market held in Dubai last week showed a 54 per cent increase of Chinese tourists visiting the Middle East between the first quarter of 2023 and the first quarter of 2024, with the UAE, Egypt and Saudi Arabia the top destinations.
China’s outbound tourism is expected to recover fully next year, led by travel to the Middle East, according to research by Oxford Economics.
The UAE, especially Dubai, is the regional leader in that sector, but Al-Khateeb, the Saudi tourism minister, said Riyadh was complementing – not competing with – Dubai or Doha.
“That’s why we initiated in Saudi Arabia, two years ago, to have a one unified visa to visit all the GCC [Gulf Cooperation Council] countries. We believe that we don’t compete but complement, and will become stronger when we work together.”
He said he had started talks with all the GCC members to host some joint programmes for Expo 2030 and the Asian Winter Games 2029, both of which will be hosted by Saudi Arabia.