The Opportunities of Tourism Development along the Silk Road

Shagarf Mullo-Abdol, TCBT Chairman and Member of PECTA

Round Table

“Bus and Coach Transport on the Silk Road Routes – Time to drive”

Dushanbe, Tuesday, 24th November 2015

The Opportunities of Tourism Development along the Silk Road

http://annoyzview.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/marco-polo-in-mosaic-form-china.jpg © Sebastian Falck

Made for Explorers

The Opportunities of Tourism Development along the Silk Road

Why travelling to the High Mountain Region and it Silk Road?

To explore new cultural horizons for tourism means to combine both, its mountains and its culture, as you more or less always will have to travel to the mountains, across the mountains or will be surrounded by mountains if you are going to explore culture. You will always travel spiritually, moved either by the mountains or the culture.

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The Opportunities of Tourism Development along the Silk Road

Challenges for tourism in Tajikistan:

accessibility(Visa and permits) cross border opportunity with neighboring countries Infrastructure, signage and road side services capacity buildingof service providers, border guards, police and custom authorities budgets and funding ofactivities

The Opportunities of Tourism Development along the Silk Road

Tourism Opportunities:

Hiking, Trekking and Wildlife Safari

Mountaineering and Climbing

Cross border cultural Tourism e.g. by Bus visiting Silk Road sities

Traveling on the Pamir Highway

Tough Tourers (4x4 Busses, Jeep tours, Motorcycles, bicycles)

Leisure tourism – Central Asia City hopping

Meanwhile exploring Central Asia you will find culture, always traveling along old trading or migration routes.

The Opportunities of Tourism Development along the Silk Road

How to improve road travel across the Silk Road?

Availability of “Silk Road isa” for trans-national tourism involving some of the countries in the region

Reducing travel barriers for tour operators from some of the neighboring countries to enable them to explore and identify trans-national tourism packages

Need for Tajikistan to establish a National Tourism Association (NTO) to lobby for the “Silk Road Visa” and to put more pressure to simplify the processes in obtaining visas and permits

Availability of GPS apps and paper map for routes along the Silk Road with guided audio-tours in major languages (English, Russian, French, etc.) featuring directions to major attractions, emergency contacts, and the locations & distance to home-stays, service stations, public toilets, etc.

The Opportunities of Tourism Development along the Silk Road

How to improve road travel across the Silk Road?

Best Practice:

The Via Regia (Royal Road) that connects eastern and western parts of Europe is a good best-practice example of cross-border road travel that could be replicated in Central Asia

(See http://www.oberlausitz.com/ferien/kulturell/via-regia/en/default.aspx)

The Opportunities of Tourism Development along the Silk Road

Tourism supports many other sectors:

• Handicraft

• Agriculture

• Transport

• Culture

• Trade

• Health

Win Win Situation!

The Opportunities of Tourism Development along the Silk Road

Conclusion: Tourism Development along the Silk Road is fostering Cross Border Tourism, Economic Development, Culture Exchange,

Poverty Reduction and Peace Enforcement.

This kind of sustainable tourism development needs to be pushed further! We have to work hard on improvement of accessibility, infrastructure, joint products and marketing activities.

Education, Cooperation, Knowledge enlargement and Compromiseare the keys for success in the High Mountains and along the Silk Road.

Trans national epic routes do not know boundaries. The Silk Road. One face to our customers.

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