Tourism Seychelles conducted a Seychelles-specific event for trade and media partners on May 30 at the Movenpick Hotel and Residences in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
The ‘Recovery in Tourism’ private event coincided with the first official visit of Tourism Minister Sylvestre Radegonde and Tourism Seychelles Director General for Destination Marketing Bernadette Willemin to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Mr. Ahmed Fathallah, who represented Tourism Seychelles in the Middle East, accompanied them. The Tourism Seychelles team was pleased to observe that 85 partners attended the event, many of whom have been working closely with Tourism Seychelles to boost the destination’s awareness in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Minister Radegonde began the event with a speech in which he thanked the Saudi Arabian travel partners for their support and dedication to the promotion of Seychelles. “I would like to express my utmost gratitude to our travel trade partners here in Saudi Arabia for being with us in tonight’s event, ‘Recovery in Tourism’. I speak for everyone when I say all of us faced many challenges during the pandemic, especially within the tourism and travel industry.”, Mr. Radegonde stated, adding, “As the world finally begins to open, we welcome you, our trade partners, who were with us all throughout this journey as tourism in Seychelles recovers.”
During the event, the team exhibited the diversity of the destination and introduced other intriguing attributes for Saudi Arabian travellers, such as the workcation programme, family-friendly vacation destination, and island-hopping adventure destination.
Mr. Fathallah, noting the appreciation for trade and media partners, states, “Appreciation is an understatement of what we truly feel towards our trade and media partners in Saudi Arabia. From the struggle of the travel industry that we all endured up until its recovery during the previous months, our trade and media partners who continued to show their ultimate support in promoting and building awareness for the destination. And with that, we truly are grateful for every one of them”.
During the evening, the Seychelles team updated the trade and media partners on the most recent information regarding travel safety in Seychelles in an effort to increase confidence in travel.
Ms. Willemin commented, “We are delighted by the outcome of tonight’s event. We express our gratitude in further strengthening our support to our travel trade and media partners here in Saudi Arabia in any way we can. We are feeling positive moving forward and now that we are experiencing a speedy recovery in the tourism industry, I firmly believe that this is just the beginning of making positive impact to the Saudi market and the overall GCC region”,
