Travel sector in Azerbaijan is expected to go through tough times was much of the commentary came down from participants of VIII Azerbaijan International Exhibition of Tourism and Travel that was held in  Baku last week. Event hosted around 100 travel companies from a number of countries. Despite the serious crisis that affected tourism sector this high profile regional event enjoyed the largest number of participants ever proving that Azerbaijan could be an interesting place for developing a travel industry even in this crisis times.

Last five years Azerbaijan travel industry enjoyed an unprecedented growth, a serious basis was laid for infrastructure development for inbound tourism. Number of foreign visitors to Azerbaijan is growing steadily and was around 1,5 million last year.

The Institute for Tourism operating under the Ministry of Culture and Tourism since 2006 has been training new personnel in eight tourism subjects. Around 900 students are studying in this Institute and will be able to fill the gap for qualified employees that travel companies lack so much in Azerbaijan.  The Institute also runs five-month training courses in hospitality management. With a growing number of hotels in Baku there is a great demand for educated staff in this area. Authorities aim to put an order in hospitality sector and raise quality standards of service provided to customers, started to license hotels and guesthouses and one of the prerequisites to obtain that license to have qualified staff. Despite this serious efforts Azerbaijan still has a long way to go to meet international criteria for quality service.

Tourists visiting Azerbaijan come mainly from Turkey, Russia, Iran and Europe. Their main point of interest is Baku, though some prefer to explore Azerbaijan deeper and choose to follow several tourism routes. The most popular routes are Baku-Zagatala, Baku-Astara, Baku-Khachmas and others. As to local tourists, they also head for rural areas of Azerbaijan to enjoy nature and picturesque landscapes. However, a great number of Azeri citizens prefer to rest abroad, visiting mainly resorts in Turkey, Russia, Egypt and Greece.

According to official statistics from the Tourism Department 59 hotels and guesthouses have been built and put into operation in Azerbaijan last year. 56 more hotels are currently being constructed.

The economic crisis has affected the tourism industry forcing many companies to revise pricing policies for their services. Many Baku hotels reduced room rates in an attempt to attract customers. Though some hotels still stick to pre-crisis rates and claim that number of number of customers has not changed dramatically since recently.

Meridian hotel located in the Old City decided to keep prices unchanged since most of their customers are foreigners and they are less sensitive to minor changes in room rates.

Other Baku hotels: AF-Hotel and Empire hotel – have recently decided to reduce prices by an average 10%.

More serious reductions are offered in regions outside Baku. For example, a single room in five star Caucasus Resort Hotel in Gabala region will cost now 99 AZN comparing to 140 AZN in the last year.

 

Statistics:

There are 250 travel companies and 370 hotels in Azerbaijan out of which 290 ones are located outside Baku. Total number of customers of Azerbaijan hotels reached 431,000 visitors in 2008. Hotels’ income was about 100 million AZN. But experts claim that these figures do not count high level of tax evasion in the hotel and tourism business. Experts believe that companies officially register only 20-25% of their customers.

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