The Maldives Roadshow was a great success in Dubai, and targeted the Middle Eastern travel trade of 4 major cities – Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Kuwait, and Doha. The Roadshows took place on August 23, 24, 26, and 27 respectively. The main objective of the Roadshow was to penetrate the Middle Eastern market and increase market share from the Middle East.
Organized by the Maldives Marketing and PR Corporation (MMPRC), 14 representative partners from the tourism industry of Maldives participated at the Roadshow together with MMPRC. They were Adaaran Resorts, Villa Hotels & Resorts, Sun Siyam Resorts, Akquasun Canopus Maldives, Loama Resorts Maldives, Reollo Travel, Anantara Kihavah, Crown Tours, Lets Go Maldives, Per Aquam Huvafen Fushi, Trav Maldives, Splendid Asia, and Starwood Maldives. The Roadshow offered a platform for the Maldives to establish direct contact with the Middle Eastern travel trade. It was also an opportunity for the Middle Eastern travel trade to receive the latest updates of Maldives as well as directly meet the representatives from some of the Maldives’ most popular hotels and resorts and travel agents who participated at the Roadshow.
The first event in Dubai saw an overwhelming 130 participants at the event. The attendees included tour wholesalers, travel agents, and media from Dubai. Over 80 participants in each of the other cities as well were interested in the destination.
Referring to the success of the first event in Dubai, Mr. Abdulla Ziyath, Managing Director of MMPRC, stated that “we have planned more activities in the Middle East to aggressively promote the destination to help achieve the targets for the year and for upcoming Visit Maldives Year 2016.” Maldives received 19,004 tourists from the Middle East from January to June 2015, which is a 6.8% increase compared to the same period in 2014. Hosting of the Roadshow will help boost arrivals from the Middle East.
