Taking a cue from the Commerce Ministry on tapping new markets for trade, the Union Ministry of Tourism plans to tap new emerging countries to attract inbound tourists.

At present, India receives about 0.6 per cent of international tourist arrivals. The expansion to new markets is to achieve 1 per cent share of international tourist arrivals by the end of year 2016.

The Ministry of Tourism plans new markets with untapped potential like Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Brazil, South Korea, Spain, Thailand, Israel and Turkey. Foreign tourist arrivals in January were 6.81 lakh compared with 6.24 lakh in January last year.

As a first step, the Ministry plans to appoint India Tourism Marketing Representatives in each of these countries to market India as a destination for tourists. The Ministry of Tourism recently issued a global Expression of Interest to appoint such representatives.

There are overseas offices in select source markets. The role of overseas offices is to generate awareness about the tourism products and destinations of the country, to promote India as a preferred tourist destination and to increase India's share in the global tourism market.

India Tourism Overseas Offices at present are located at Tokyo, Beijing, Singapore, Sydney, Dubai, Johannesburg, Milan, Frankfurt, Amsterdam, Paris, London, New York, Toronto and Los Angeles to cover traditional tourist source markets from where the country receives a large number of tourists.

The representatives will proactively seek, establish and maintain contacts with travel trade companies and media on behalf of the Ministry of Tourism and monitor trends in travel, tourism industry and developments that may affect tourism to India, said the EoI notice.

raja@thehindu.co.in

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